Points For Logic
by Slenderlock
Summary: A re-write of the end of Sock Opera, in which Bill does manage to get ahold of the journal.
1. Chapter 1

This couldn't be happening.

It was the only thought Dipper's mind could register. _This isn't happening, this isn't happening, this _can't _be happening- _

It was impossible, even judging by the altered definition of what was "possible" in this town.

Damn it, he had no idea where either of them were. He hadn't paid enough attention to Mabel's stupid puppet show to remember where she'd actually chosen to show the stupid thing. And he hadn't been able to follow them- he barely knew how to float properly.

Dipper knew a few swear words. Enough that probably upset his great uncle if he wanted to. Right now, he wished he knew every single one.

The first emotion that overtook him as he drifted aimlessly through the streets was panic. What was going to happen to him? Was he ever going to get his own body back? What would happen if he didn't? And Mabel- what would happen to her? Would Bill hurt her?

"It's been a long time, Gravity Falls," Bill had said. Well, according to Mabel, anyway. What did that mean? He'd been here before, but hadn't been able to come back? Had he been banished? Would that happen to Dipper, too?

No, no. Bill had to be summoned because he was actually a demon. And Dipper seemed to be completely devoid of demonic powers.

_You're basically a ghost._

That was one relief, at least. He wouldn't be going anywhere. Points for logic, yes.

Seriously, where the heck had Bill gone? The puppet show had to be _somewhere. _Dipper stopped, hovering over a grate in the pavement. Maybe he was just going about this all wrong. He glanced at the surrounding streets before willing his body- well, no, he technically didn't have a body anymore- willing himself to float upwards into the air. Perhaps a bird's eye view would be better?

Bingo.

Flying, it seemed, depended more on him imagining rather than actual force of will, which really didn't make sense. What did the brain have to do with anythin- Dipper forced himself to ignore the physics of being a ghost for the moment, concentrating instead on making himself fly down to the theater. After a moment of hesitation over whether it was moral to enter without having purchased a ticket, and another moment in which he reasoned that technically he wasn't going to see the show from the audience's perspective and therefore it would be just fine, he forced himself through the wall and into the hall.

"Mabel," he muttered, scanning the rows of seats for his sister. No doubt she'd be out and about, chatting. "Mabel, Mabel, where are you?"

There she was, right in the front. And no, he couldn't believe it- Bill had gotten there first. No, no, no, no, this wasn't good. Dipper watched helplessly as Bill followed his sister behind the curtain.

Talking to Grenda was a bust, of course it was. Dipper was losing focus. He _knew _no one could hear him, so why was he bothering talking to people? He was nothing but a ghost, stuck without a vessel-

A vessel.

o0O0o

Sighing in relief as she felt the cake being hoisted back up, Mabel flipped furiously through the journal. "Come on, come on now, there must be a way to get Dipper's body back."

"Oh, but why would you want to do that?"

Mabel started, snapping the book shut. "Bill Dipper!" She paused for a second, looking up at the figure who was holding the rope. Her eyes narrowed. "Bipper."

"Shh," Bill warned, still smiling. "You wouldn't want to ruin the show." They both peered down past the scaffolding to where Gabe was sitting, seeming to enjoy the production. "Hm. Whoops!"

Mabel clutched the side of the cake as it dropped a few inches.

"How's about you hand that book over?" Bill continued, reaching forward.

"No way! This is Dippers," Mabel said, letting go of the side of the cake to better protect Dipper's journal. "I'd never give it away."

"Well, you didn't seem to have a problem taking it for your own play," Bill reminded her. "Or ditching him when he needed you." Bill shrugged, still easily holding the rope. How strong was he, anyway? "Since when did you suddenly start caring about what your brother wants?" He laughed.

Mabel rubbed a thumb over the edge of the book. Bill sort of did have a point. And besides, Dipper was down there on stage. And so were Grenda and Candy- if the cake fell, they could be hurt- and all of their work would be ruined. Grenda and Candy had stayed up with her that night to paint the set, to sew the war monster. They'd be devastated if the show was ruined. And the book wasn't a weapon, was it? What was the worst that could happen? Dipper probably had it all memorized by now, anyway, right?

With a sigh, she pulled the book from her lap.

"Ha. Who would sacrifice everything they've worked for just for their dumb sibling?" Bill mused, fingers clasping the spine of the journal.

Wait a minute. Mabel tightened her grip. "Dipper would." She made to tug the book- and by extension, Bill- back into the cake prop, but-

"Ah, ah, ah, too late! You forget- I'm a being of pure energy." Bill yanked the book out of her hand. He was stronger than Dipper ever had been- after all, he'd lifted the prop without too much difficulty. "You thought you could- you really thought-" Bill burst into laughter.

Mabel clambered up out of the cake and onto the scaffolding. Bill smirked, holding the book aloft with one hand, the rope in the other. "And now I've got what _I _want… Well, no. I'm not giving you anything, actually."

Dipper's mouth stretched into a grin that seemed impossibly wide, before the light left his eyes. The rope slid through his fingers, the cake prop came crashing down on the stage. Dipper's body swung back, forth, and back again before tumbling off the scaffolding.

"_Dipper!" _Forgetting Bill entirely, Mabel clung to the metal bars, reaching desperately for her brother.

o0O0o

No!

Dipper dropped the puppets, not caring that the show was now ruined. Bill slipped up out of his body, leaving it to fall to the ground. He couldn't do anything to cushion the fall, and so he watched as his body landed on the remains of the cake prop, rebounded up into the air with its own momentum, and came crashing down again.

"Dipper!"

Mabel was climbing down the scaffolding, sprinting over to her brother's body.

By some miracle, Grenda seemed to know what to do, and soon the curtains were closed. Dipper ignored the voice over telling the crowd not to panic, that the show was over.

"Dipper- where are you, Dipper?"

"Too bad, Pine Tree."

Dipper whirled around to see- oh, no, Bill. He'd gotten the journal. Dipper surged forward, but Bill was faster, vanishing with a snap.

"No!" He couldn't let Bill get away with that journal, he _couldn't. _And his body would still be there when he got back, right? They wouldn't just get rid of it.

Following the faint trace of echoing laughter, Dipper left the theater and began scouring the streets. But there didn't appear to be a trace of Bill, damn it. Maybe the woods? The bunker! That's where the writer had hidden, and now that Bill had the journal, maybe he'd go there?

Another point for logic.

Within a few minutes, he had relocated the bunker and found his way back inside. After learning how to do what was the floating equivalent of sprinting, he could cover much more ground. The existence of demonic powers was still, sadly, off the table, which was a shame. Teleportation would have been useful.

"Bill?" he called, curious as to how he could technically talk without air physically vibrating his vocal chords. Maybe that was why no one else could hear him. "Bill! Give me that journal back!"

"Well, well, well, if it isn't little Pine Tree."

Dipper spun on the spot to see Bill flipping through the journal.

"Your handwriting's terrible. Still, it's not the worst I've seen."

"That's mine!" Dipper snatched for it, but Bill pulled the book away from his reach.

"No, not really. Since you stole it," Bill pointed out. "And I don't think I'll be giving this back any time soon."

"We had a deal," Dipper said, frowning. "And you broke it. You got your stupid puppet, you said you'd help me- you said you'd let me into that laptop. And you lied!"

"Demon, kid. Lying's part of the job." Bill shrugged.

"So, what, you're just going to destroy my journal?" Dipper clenched his fists in frustration. "That's not _fair._"

"Life's not fair, kid." Bill sounded unimpressed. He lit a small flame with the tip of his finger and inched it closer to the journal. "Besides, even if I offered it to you, you couldn't physically take it back, now, could you?" Bill might not have had a mouth, but Dipper knew a smug smile when he saw one.

"Give it _back," _Dipper warned. "Look, come on, just-"

"Give it up, Pine Tree. I've got plans and you're not getting in my way."

"It's just a journal! There's, like, one entry on you. And all it says is that you shouldn't be summoned at all costs. I didn't even summon you, you summoned yourself. And the rest of it's just-"

"You really want it back, huh?" The flame extinguished.

"I- yes?" Dipper blinked. "I mean, uh. Yeah. That's why I followed you here?"

"Tell you what." Bill snapped his fingers. The journal vanished. "I think I'll keep it. You know, seeing how badly you want it."

"What?"

"Maybe if you make me an offer later, I'll consider giving it back to you."

"How do I know you're not lying?" Dipper pointed out. "I don't have very many reasons to- wait, no. I don't have _any_ reasons to trust you."

"What other choice do you have?"

Well. That was a good point. Dipper didn't have anything to say to that.

"See you, kid. And I do mean _see _you." Bill's eye closed in what might have been a wink. With a laugh at his own pun- and come on, that wasn't even a good pun- Bill was gone.

o0O0o

It took Dipper a little while to find his way out of the woods. The sun was long gone by now, and in the dark there really wasn't a good way to keep track of location. But, guided by the faint lights of the city, Dipper finally started back towards the shack.

Floating wasn't nearly as tiring as walking, since he wasn't using his muscles to move around- though technically if he walked, he still wouldn't get tired, as he didn't even have muscles, right? Ghost physics. Ugh. Dipper finally reached the shack again, long after the moon had set as well.

The shack was silent. Dipper glanced through the rooms- there was Grunkle Stan, asleep. There was Mabel. So where was he? Where was his body?

Slightly worried, now, Dipper meandered through the other levels of the shack- what was that noise?

It sounded like people talking.

Dipper dropped through the floor into the room that housed the couch to see-

The television was on.

On the couch was his body, lying limply over the cushions. Dipper could just make out the slow rise and fall of his chest. That was weird- his body was still alive? Maybe the ghost was just his subconscious? And the reason that he still looked like him was because his brain had just imagined himself that way? That would make sense, seeing as he was still wearing clothes. And Bill was a dream demon- he'd be able to mess with the conscious and subconscious.

Sitting next to him on the couch was Wendy. She was watching the television with lidded eyes, fighting sleep. Every so often she'd glance down at Dipper's body, which was still lying motionless.

Dipper didn't know how to go about getting back into his own body. Did he just have to go through it?

Worth a shot.

Dipper hovered above the couch, closed his eyes, and floated down.

Oh, everything hurt.

With a small groan, he opened his eyes.

"Dipper?"

Another groan. Wendy hovered over him, suddenly awake and alert. Dipper tried to sit up, but a sudden pain in his gut stopped him halfway. He hissed at it, clenching his jaw.

"Relax, relax. You're all right," she said, putting a hand on his shoulder and pressing him back down onto the couch. "I told them I'd stand watch over you. Stan's not good at staying awake for too long, and your sister was pretty freaked out."

"What happened?" Dipper asked, throat dry. "Ugh, my mouth tastes terrible."

"After you, uh, fell, Stan and I- and Soos- went to the back entrance and picked you and your sister up. She was really upset, seemed to think it was her fault. I mean, I don't know what happened. But anyway." Wendy shrugged. "You were pretty beat up. Stan patched you up, but we're not sure how badly you're hurt. You fell a pretty long ways."

"Mabel," Dipper said, remembering his sister. "Mabel, I have to see her, I have to tell-"

"Calm down." Wendy forced him down again. "It can wait until morning. She needs her sleep, and you need just about as much rest as you can get."

There was no denying that.

"Oh, I almost forgot." Wendy smiled, bending over the side of the couch. "Candy found this backstage, thought you'd want it back."

Dipper's vision was very suddenly obscured by the brim of a hat. He laughed weakly, despite himself.

"Thanks."

"Hey." Wendy took the hat off his head and set it down on his chest. She sat on the other end of the couch. Dipper's left foot brushed her leg.

"Hm?"

"You really scared me back there." Wendy slipped off her own hat and set it in her lap. "For a while, we didn't know if you were-" She broke off, twisting the side of the hat between her fingers. "Anyway. I care about you, I mean." Wendy looked up and over, and were her eyes wet or was the television just reflecting a little bit more than usual?

"Wendy."

"Look, Dipper. I- whatever happens, or ends up happening. No matter what you feel or whatever, that'll always be true. All right? Friends or not or whatever. I'll always care about you."

Dipper nodded weakly.

"Get some sleep." Wendy stood, putting her hat back on. "I'll go tell Stan you're awake. Mabel will probably come down and see you in the morning. Just a warning."

Dipper nodded again.

As Wendy left, Dipper closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep. As he struggled to calm his mind, he realized that there was a stupid grin stuck on his face.

Even if Wendy never felt the same about him, even if she got a hundred new boyfriends, even if she ended up marrying one of them and Dipper had to be best man- even if all of that happened, she still cared about him. And that was what really mattered, wasn't it?

o0O0o

Oddly enough, nightmares weren't what woke Dipper from his sleep. He'd half expected to fall into a horrible dream where he'd lost control of himself again, but his mind had probably just been too tired to handle constructing something even that basic.

No, he woke to something far more terrifying.

"_Dipper!"_

"Augh!"

Dipper sat up sharply at the sound of his sister's voice, wincing at the pain in his lower back. He flexed his feet experimentally and yes, he could still feel them. Thank god.

"Mabel?"

"Who else?"

Mabel hugged him tightly, which hurt rather a lot, but Dipper decided against telling her.

"Hey, kid."

Dipper looked over Mabel's shoulder to see Grunkle Stan coming down the stairs. He rubbed at his eyes and yawned before disappearing through the doorway.

"Grunkle Stan," Dipper said, smiling. "Mabel- Mabel, seriously, get off me-"

"Not a chance, bro-bro." Reluctantly, though, she pulled away. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I was hit by a bus," Dipper said, looking down at his body. It was covered up by the blanket, but he could still feel every bruise. "Ugh, look at that." He pulled his arm up, and yes, there were fork marks with caked blood that had coagulated over the wounds. "Gross."

"What happened, kid?"

Dipper blinked. Stan, now with a mug of coffee, had come back into the room. Dipper hid his arm.

"I fell off the scaffolding," he explained. "Um. I was supposed to be the minister for the show, and I was getting into the wedding cake. But I slipped and fell." He wiggled his shoes. "I guess I just wasn't used to the shoes, or something."

Mabel blinked, but seemed to understand.

"Hm." Stan looked skeptical, but not unconvinced. "Well, it was enough to knock you out for this long. You woke up at, what, two?"

"He woke up and you didn't tell me?" Mabel interjected, sounding incredibly offended. "Why not? He's _my _brother! Why did you get to know?"

"Mabel, look-"

"He took it," Dipper said, more to himself than to them. The room fell silent. "The journal, it's- it's gone."

Mabel tugged at her hair nervously. "I- I didn't mean to- I- I'm sorry," she stammered.

"What do you mean, it's gone?" Stan asked, stepping over to the couch and kneeling. "Where did it go?"

"It was wrecked," Mabel said quickly. "In the dressing room, one of the lightbulbs broke, and it caught on fire."

Considering what Bill had almost done to the book, it wasn't a half bad lie.

"Now what do we do? That journal was everything, Mabel, without it, we'll never be able to-"

"Calm down," Stan said, standing again.

"I will _not_ calm down." Dipper sat up properly, ignoring the various bruises that protested. Stan didn't know about Bill, and Dipper really didn't want to let him know. For one thing, it was kind of embarrassing that he'd been tricked and actually made a deal with the demon. And for another, he had a feeling that Stan hadn't been telling him the whole truth. There wasn't any point in showing all his cards, now. So Stan had to think the journal had really been destroyed. "That journal was our only key to knowing anything around here. Now we're stuck."

"You remember most of it, right?" Mabel asked.

"Some of it, I guess. Not all of it." Dipper frowned.

"I shouldn't have used it as a prop, I'm sorry," Mabel said, stuffing her hands in her front pocket.

"Mabel- no, no, it's not your fault."

"It is, though."

"It's not. You didn't know what was going to happen."

"If I'd been more careful-"

"Mabel."

"Kids, look."

Mabel and Dipper both turned to Stan.

"Later, we can talk about the journal. You can talk about it. But right now, you look like you fell off of a building." He looked to Mabel.

"And you- you need to leave him alone, he needs his rest."

"Leave him alone? Why, so he can sit there doing nothing?"

"No, so he can rest. You know. Regrow bones. Whatever."

"No way, he needs love and care. You know all about that, right, Grunkle Stan?"

"Sure."

Dipper closed his eyes and let the familiar sounds of bickering wash over him. For now, things were okay. Bill might have the book, and he might be in over his head with the whole lying-to-Grunkle-Stan thing, but he was okay. He had his sister, his sister had him. They had each other.

They were okay.


	2. Chapter 2

One thing about being drastically injured that Dipper found he actually didn't mind was the fact that he didn't have to work at the Shack. Instead, he spent the next day and a half on the couch, with nothing more than the TV to keep him company. He wished he still had the journal with him to read- no matter how many times he'd looked through it, there was always something he'd missed on the last go around.

But it wouldn't do to think about the journal, now. There was nothing he could do about it, not in this state, at least. He sighed to himself, neck propped sideways by the brace, only half paying attention to the show that was on at the moment. Mabel, sat on the floor in front of the couch, was focused intently.

Mabel would pop by every chance she got to give him snacks and keep him company, and together they'd laugh at the ridiculous shows that passed for good television in this town.

"Ducktective, come back!" the constable cried, looking helplessly at the pond.

The duck on the screen quacked a few times, the subtitles revealing him to be saying "just call me 'duck' now".

"Ohmygosh, Dipper, isn't that _sad?_" Mabel pounded her fist on the couch, thankfully not too close to where Dipper's arm was lying.

He heaved his cast covered arm over a little, anyway.

"Eh, the show's shot so badly it's kind of hard to empathize with-"

"Nerd." Mabel giggled. She looked up at the clock on the wall. "Oop, I gotta go." Dipper tried to look at the clock too, but the neck brace stopped him.

"I hate this thing," he grumbled. "I don't even need it." Mabel giggled.

"Don't break anything else while I'm gone!"

Dipper watched enviously as his sister stood up, stretched, and jogged out of the room. Not having to work at the Shack might have been nice, but he really did miss walking sometimes. He closed his eyes, trying to drown out the television with his own thoughts.

If only he had that journal back.

Bill had wanted to destroy it, clearly, but he hadn't. For some reason, he'd kept it for himself. For leverage, that was it. But what more could he want from Dipper? After that fiasco, Dipper had learned his lesson. He was never making another deal with that demon, never.

"Hey, there."

Dipper opened his eyes in shock at the voice. He would have sat up if it weren't for the bruised ribs. The room was empty, as far as he could tell. But the voice, it had sounded so real. So close. It couldn't be- why would he come back? And why now?

"Seems a shame you can't turn your neck at all," Bill's voice said again, distinctly from behind Dipper's head. "Here, lemme fix that."

He heard Bill snap his fingers, and at once the brace was gone- along with all the pain in his neck. Dipper blinked, bringing his good hand up and gingerly touching it. Sure enough, his neck was completely healed. He tried not to appreciate it too much. Doubtless, Bill would end up restoring the injury before he left, just to spite him.

With his newfound neck-freedom, Dipper looked over his shoulder. But Bill wasn't there, either.

"You look pretty banged up, kid."

Dipper snapped his neck back around- and there he was. Floating directly above his chest and surveying the sight of Dipper beneath him, Bill Cipher twirled his stupid cane.

"Man, I forgot how much time it takes you humans to heal. I mean, can you imagine having to do this every time you bumped up against a wall?" Bill laughed. Dipper didn't.

"What do you want, Bill?"

"It's been boring without you, Pine Tree." Bill waved his cane away and it vanished. "I didn't think it'd take this long for you to get all patched up. So now I've got nothing to do."

"That makes two of us," Dipper muttered. The television was still blaring on about- hold on, no, it wasn't. The television was stuck on one single frame of the Ducktective show. Come to think of it… nothing else in the Shack was moving, either. The air seemed strangely stagnant.

"Figured I could make things easier. Make sure no one bothers us." Bill tipped his hat. "You're welcome."

"Oh, right, like I would ever thank you." Dipper frowned. "Seriously, Bill, what do you want?"

"I just noticed you looking pathetic down here, and I thought I'd help out. Call it a favor."

"Help out," Dipper repeated. "What, you mean, like you did with my neck?"

"Exactly." Bill flicked his finger in the direction of Dipper's chest, and at once the pain of his bruised rib was gone. Dipper sat up, experimentally. "Those two are freebies. If you want the rest," Bill began, but Dipper cut him off.

"No way! I'm not making another deal with you, Bill." He frowned. Even if Bill ended up giving him back the bruised rib and the neck brace, he would refuse.

"It wouldn't be anything too strenuous," Bill continued. "And besides, remember what I have." Another snap of his fingers and the journal was hovering in the air between them. Dipper eyed it shrewdly.

"You wouldn't just heal me completely and give me the journal back, even if it meant you got something in return," he argued. "You're trying to trick me, aren't you?"

"Yeesh, kid, do you ever stop worrying?" Bill rolled his eye. "If you make this deal, I promise that when those two legs get up and start walking, those hands will hold that book." He took the book back and flipped lazily through the pages. "And you won't feel a smidgen of pain."

"Yeah, yeah. And what do you want in return?"

"Really, Pine Tree? You still don't trust me?"

"No."

Bill sighed. The book disappeared again. "I'm doing this for you, Pine Tree. Really, I am."

"Then why are you making a deal?"

"Because I have to." Bill shrugged. "Demon, remember? I can't give things without making it a fair trade and taking something in return."

"You healed my neck and my ribs," Dipper pointed out. "Doesn't that technically violate your rules?"

Bill appeared to hesitate for just a fraction of a second. "Good eyes, Pine Tree. Just for that, I think I'll give you a reward." He clapped his hands, and the laptop materialized between them. It landed gently on the bed.

"The- but you destroyed this!" Dipper put his good hand on the top of the laptop. It felt real enough. Even if Bill had completely demolished the thing, he supposed the demon probably had the power to restore it again. "And besides, even if you gave this back to me, I still won't be able to get in."

"Well, I'm not just going to give you the password," Bill mused. "But I could take off the program that limits the number of times you can try for that password."

Dipper frowned. "What do you want in return?"

"I'm doing you a favor, Pine Tree. I told you, this is all for you." He circled around the bed lazily. "I can't actually give you anything without taking anything in return."

Dipper didn't say anything to that.

"So how about this- I'll take one thing from this room."

"Oh, yeah, right." Dipper rolled his eyes. "Like I'd ever take that offer."

"You can tell me what not to take," Bill added. "Go on, look around. I won't take anything you tell me not to. Promise." He crossed a finger over his bowtie.

"So you… you're making this deal for me? As a favor? Why?"

"Eh, it's boring without you," Bill reminded him. "And besides, I might feel sorry for you. Might." Bill didn't entirely meet Dipper's eyes at that last comment. He made a throat clearing noise which Dipper was pretty sure was unnecessary, before continuing. "And as for the laptop- I did promise you last time that I'd help you out with it. So really, I'm making good on my other deal."

Dipper frowned. "I still don't trust you. But…" He didn't see any loopholes in Bill's offer. He'd get the journal back, he'd get the laptop back, and he'd be completely healed. And as long as he made sure Bill didn't take anything important from the room, then everything would be fine. Wouldn't it?

"And if I take your deal, you'll…?"

"I'll deliver what I promised," Bill said, nodding. He brought the journal back and levitated it tantalizingly over Dipper's chest. "Just tell me what I can't take and we'll be fair and square."

Dipper thought for a moment. "The television, you can't take," he started off saying. "Um. Or the laptop. Or the journal, because technically that's in the room right now." He looked around the room, trying to see if there was anything else he'd forgotten. "Nothing of Mabel's."

"Will do," Bill agreed. "Is that it?"

"I… think so," Dipper said, nodding. "Uh. The couch, don't take the couch. Actually, don't take anything that's bigger than me."

Bill's eye seemed to gleam for a split second. "Done."

"All right. Fine."

Bill held his hand out, cool blue flames encasing it. "Shake on it, Pine Tree. Seal the deal."

After a moment or two of hesitation, Dipper grasped Bill's hand with his own, blue flames crawling over his skin. "Fine," he said again. "Deal."

Nothing happened for a few seconds. Bill pulled his hand away, snapping his fingers. The journal fell onto the bed. He snapped again, and Dipper felt as every single wound that he'd acquired since the last time he'd run into Bill vanished. He felt his stomach experimentally, knocked on the now useless cast around his wrist, and chanced a smile.

"Uh, thanks," he said, looking up at Bill.

"No problem, Pine Tree." Bill hovered over him for a moment before grabbing his shoulders.

"What- hold on, what are you doing?"

"I told you, Pine Tree. When those two legs get up and walking again, you won't feel a thing. Because you won't be the one walking." He tightened his grip on Dipper's shoulders and _pulled._

Even after having experienced it once before, the sensation of being forcibly torn out of his own body was still the weirdest thing Dipper had ever felt in his life.

"But- but-" he stuttered, hopelessly looking at his hand, which was semi translucent once again. "But we had a deal!" In the corner of his eye, he could see the characters on the television screen begin to move again.

"I made good on my promise," Bill pointed out, and yeah, it was still weird to watch his own body move and speak when he wasn't doing the moving or the speaking. "And hey, now I have two things to hold over your head."

"No, no, no, no, _no!_" Dipper circled around the room, clutching his head. How could he have done this? He knew it had to have been too good to be true, so why, why, why had he done it? "You lied to me! You said you were doing this for me!"

"And I was," Bill agreed. "I was doing it for you- for your body." He cackled in a voice that Dipper promised himself he would never make. To him, it was obvious that the voice coming out of his throat wasn't his, but he supposed to anyone else, it would sound more or less normal. Maybe if Bill never cracked his voice, the others would figure it out.

"What, you thought I cared about you enough to just waste a perfectly good deal on you?" Bill asked, incredulously. "Pine Tree, I'm flattered. Really, I am." He stretched Dipper's arms. "Ooh, now that you're all healed up, your body feels fan_tastic!_ And hey, your memories will make for a few laughs, won't they?"

"My memories?"

"I _am _a dream demon, kid. You think I don't know everything about the subconscious? Your brain's still here, and while your consciousness may be staring at me right now, your subconscious is up for grabs."

Mabel still had that one last sock puppet, didn't she? If he managed to keep Bill from knowing that she'd saved one, then he'd be able to warn her in time.

"Woah- careful, there, still not used to the whole depth perception thing." Bill laughed, standing and tottering around. "Whoo- now that I know you humans need all that sleep and sustenance, this'll be a breeze." He picked up the journal and the laptop.

"What are you doing with those?" Dipper asked, hovering closer nervously.

"Relax." Bill stuffed the laptop under the couch and wandered over to the TV. He slid the journal underneath it, grinning. "That should keep them safe, don't you think?"

He'd just have to tell Mabel where they were, she'd be able to find them and hide them in their attic somewhere.

As if on cue, his sister burst through the door, grinning ear to ear. "Dipper, Dipper, Dipper, Dipper, _Dipper!_ Guess what!"

"What?" Bill asked, in that horrid tone of voice that Dipper had grown to hate. It almost sounded like him, it really did. Mabel seemed to realize there was something wrong with her brother.

"Woah, something happen to you? Why are you standing up? And where'd your neck brace go?"

"I told you, I don't need it." Why, oh why had he said that? Bill still had the stupid cast on, he could fake being injured, of course he could. "And I've been feeling a lot better, lately."

"Oh." Mabel shrugged, then seemed to regain her excitement. "Grunkle Stan gave me the rest of the day off! He said you looked all sad and stuff so I should go cheer you up."

"Well, I'm feeling fine." Bill smiled back. In Dipper's opinion, he still had a lot to learn in terms of what smiling entailed. "But I think it's probably better if you don't tell him I'm up and about. You know how much he worries about things."

Mabel drew a finger over her lips, nodding. "You wanna watch TV?"

"Eh, I'm bored of that stuff. We could go upstairs and have a puppet show instead?" Bill offered.

Oh no. Bill knew about the puppet, _Bill knew about the puppet. _

"I only have one left, it wouldn't be much of a show."

Not waiting to hear Bill's response, Dipper soared up and into the attic, now used to the sensation of flying. He scoured the room, looking desperately for- there! Mabel's puppet was lying by the side of her bed. He hurriedly stuck his hand in and carried it up and out of the attic's open window. Now he just had to hide it somewhere Bill wouldn't find it. And he had to make sure no one noticed a puppet levitating on its own.

After securing the puppet somewhere safe, Dipper returned to the Shack, searching for Bill. He and Mabel had already made it to the attic, and Bill was looking a little frustrated. Dipper sighed in relief.

"It was here, by my bed," Mabel was saying, animatedly. "I don't know where it could have gone, Dipper, I'm sorry. Maybe the goat ate it. Or Waddles."

"That's all right," Bill said, though Dipper knew he didn't think of it as "all right" in the slightest. "We'll just have to think of something else to do."

o0O0o

Being of pure energy or not, Bill was still in a human body. And Dipper wasn't. So when the clock struck three in the morning, Bill was fast asleep and Dipper was hovering nervously over his sister's bed, puppet in hand. Cautiously, he tapped her on the shoulder with the puppet.

Mabel didn't move.

He tapped her again, a little more forcefully. Mabel mumbled something and rolled over in her bed. On the other side of the room, Bill slept on. If that body was still Dipper's, then it would take a lot more than whispering to wake him up.

Dipper made the puppet "eat" Mabel's hair and tugged it, lightly. Mabel was awake in an instant, and Dipper hurriedly slapped the puppet over her mouth, muffling her effectively. When she realized there was no one holding the puppet that she could see, she stopped trying to talk.

Dipper pulled the puppet away.

Mabel looked over at the bed where Dipper's body was sleeping, and then back at the puppet.

"Mabel," Dipper whispered, making the puppet talk with him. "Mabel, you have to listen to me. Get out of the attic so I can talk to you."

Mabel nodded, looking at Dipper's body again. She crept out of the bed and tiptoed out of the room expertly. Bill slept on, oblivious.

Once they were out of the Shack and at the edge of the woods, she launched into her stream of questions again.

"Dipper, did he- is that Bill in your body?" she demanded, keeping her voice low but not limiting it to a whisper.

"He tricked me again," Dipper said, making the Mabel puppet mirror his words. "I didn't- he made an offer, and I didn't see any loopholes, but he tricked me and I- Mabel, he has the book and the laptop. The laptop's under the couch and the journal's under the TV, you have to find them and hide them-"

"Slow down there, brother, let's think about this." Mabel sat down on the stump, frowning. "If I take them and hide them right away, then he'll know something's up."

"Fair point," Dipper agreed. "And he said he wasn't going to destroy them, so for now they're safe."

"Okay." Mabel tucked her hands into her sleeves, worrying. "How are you going to get back into your body, Dipper? I don't even know how you did it last time."

"Well, he passed out from exhaustion," Dipper said. "But he's asleep right now and he's fine. I think… I think you just need to force him unconscious. That way, his consciousness is taken by surprise, and he'll be forced out."

"I'm not going to _hit _you! You're already injured enough as it is, Dipper."

"Well, uh." Dipper let the puppet hang in the air for a few seconds. "Not really, no."

"Oh, _Dipper._"

"He was offering to heal me!" Dipper gestured wildly with the puppet, and it slipped off his hand and landed on the grass. Despite the situation, Mabel laughed. "It's not funny," he grumbled.

Mabel didn't say anything. Point taken; she really couldn't hear him if he wasn't possessing the puppet. He slipped the Mabel puppet back on his hand.

"You have to knock me unconscious."

"I'm still not gonna hit you over the head," Mabel said, crossing her arms.

"Then find someone who will?"

"We'll just have to wear you out," she decided.

"How are you going to do that?" Dipper groaned. "Mabel, we don't have time for that! I don't even know what Bill wants with my body. We have to stop him from doing whatever it is before it's too late- you have to knock me unconscious!"

"Dipper, I can't do that-"

"You have to."

Mabel twisted the ends of her sweater sleeves. "Dipper…"

"I'll be fine. A bruise on the head is nothing."

Mabel chewed her bottom lip. "I'll try."

Dipper sighed. "Okay. Good." He looked back at the Shack. "You also can't let Bill know that you know it's him. You have to pretend like it's me in there, you got it?"

"Got it." Mabel nodded. "Good luck, Dipper."

"The puppet will be in this tree," Dipper said, floating over towards the tree nearest the stump and slipping the puppet underneath the roots. "If he tries to find it, don't let him come here or see it."

"I won't." Mabel nodded again, standing. "Good luck, Dipper."

"Thanks." Dipper looked at the puppet in his hand for a moment. It wasn't actually all that bad of a puppet. "Go back to the Shack and go to sleep, all right? I won't have the puppet with me all the time, so I won't be able to talk to you. But I'll try to be there. And Bill can see me, so if you watch him, you might be able to figure out where I am."

"Got it." Mabel pulled the sleeves back so her hands were useable again. "We'll get you back in your body, Dipper. Promise."

And with that, she was off towards the Shack again. Dipper sighed, leaving the puppet underneath the tree. He followed Mabel to the Shack, but drifted up to the roof instead of heading inside.

He had no idea what Bill was planning. He wasn't going to destroy the journal or the laptop, so why was he bothering to take over Dipper's body? What did he want? What couldn't he get otherwise? And why did he seem so intent to ruin _Dipper's _life?

As Dipper waited on the roof for the sun to rise, he thought back on the deal he'd made.

Why had he made it? Why hadn't he seen that it was a trick? What had changed his mind?

"_Besides, I might feel sorry for you."_

He shook his head. Idiot, he'd been an idiot.

"_I'm doing you a favor."_

Why had he believed that stupid triangle?

"_This is all for you."_

Once this was over, he was never talking to Bill again.

"_I just noticed you looking pathetic down here, and I thought I'd help out. Call it a favor."_

Idiot. Idiot. Idiot.

"_It's been boring without you, Pine Tree."_

And as much as he tried to distract himself, Dipper's thoughts were still centered around Bill Cipher when the sun rose above the trees the next morning.


	3. Chapter 3

By the time Dipper had retreated from the roof and checked underneath the TV and the couch, making sure that the laptop and the journal were still there, Stan was up and getting ready for work. Mabel, amazingly, was up even before him.

"Stan-cakes!"

A plate bearing a large Stan-shaped pancake slid across the table. Mabel had evidently perfected her newfound skill of baking people's faces into pancakes. Particularly Stan's.

"Hey, you got the hat right this time." Stan poked at the pancake, which smiled up at him. He shrugged and began to devour his own face, occasionally stopping to lather it in syrup again.

Dipper- no, Bill- walked through the doorway, yawning and scratching at first his left eye, then his right.

"Good morning, sister," he greeted. "Oh, look, food!" Bill promptly trotted over to where Stan was sitting, grabbed the pancake, and took a bite. Syrup leaked out of the pancake and ran down his fingers, landing on his pajamas and soaking into the fabric. "_Delicious._"

"Hey- get your hands off my face!" Stan scowled. "Give that back-"

Bill took another bite of the pancake, holding it tighter. The syrup sluggishly dribbled out, this time landing on his socks.

"On second thought," Stan amended, wrinkling his nose, "keep it."

"Dipper, that was Stan's pancake," Mabel scolded. "If you want a face pancake, you'll just have to ask for one." She sounded for all the world like she really was scolding her twin brother. Dipper made a mental note to do her a few favors in return when he got back in his own body.

If he got back in his own body.

"I'm good." Bill didn't seem to care that he was acting… well, acting like Bill.

"Kid, did you get enough sleep?" Stan asked, regarding Bill shrewdly.

"Oh, plenty." Bill bit off pancake-Stan's right eye.

"Dipper's just being a butt-face," Mabel said, shrugging.

"Whatever." Stan stretched, yawned, and stood. "See you kids when the Shack opens." With that, he was gone.

Bill set the pancake back down on the plate, huffing. He pressed his fingers to the palm of his hand, one by one. The maple syrup left them sticky and sweet.

"Wash your dumb hands," Mabel said, grabbing his wrist and dragging him to the sink. She turned the water on and Bill obediently ran his hands underneath the stream, seemingly fascinated by the concept of indoor plumbing.

o0O0o

Apart from several instances of Bill encountering strange twenty first century devices that he'd never seen before, the day went smoothly. Dipper tailed Bill relentlessly, never letting the puppeteer out of his sight, determined to catch the demon in the middle of the act.

But nothing happened.

The Friday evening was drowsy; after all, the Shack wasn't open on weekends. The exhaustion of the week seemed to have caught up with everyone.

"Kid, I need you to put these up." Abandoning the inspection he was doing of the space between floors, Dipper followed Stan's voice into the gift shop. A few straggling tourists were rummaging through the knick knacks, wondering what to take home. Wendy, reclining in her chair at the checkout counter, eyed them with irritation as she flipped between pages of her magazine. And by the door was Stan, holding out a stack of papers out as he hovered over Bill.

"Sure thing," Bill said, chipper as ever.

Stan handed him the papers and adjusted his hat. He glanced around the gift shop. "Yeesh." One look at Wendy and his mind was made up. "The shop closes in five minutes, people! If you haven't made your purchases by then, I'm tacking on an extra exit fee of seven- no, eight- dollars," he announced. Wendy smiled from behind her magazine. Stan turned back to Dipper's body. Bill's eyes looked expectantly up at him. "Just be back before it gets dark," Stan added.

"Of course."

Dipper followed Bill through the woods until the Mystery Shack was out of sight. Evening light poured through the leaves, golden and bright.

Bill hadn't spoken to him once since the first night. He hadn't even looked Dipper's way during the day- could he even see Dipper?

"I didn't take you for a tiger mom," Bill said, tossing the papers down on the ground and turning to face Dipper, who blinked and shrunk a few inches back.

"A what?"

"But, well, with the way you've been hovering around me," Bill continued, as if Dipper hadn't spoken. He tutted. "Why, it's almost like you don't trust me."

"What do you want?" Dipper demanded. "To hurt Mabel? Stan? Wendy?"

"Why would I want that?" Bill retorted. "Kid, if I wanted to hurt your sister, she'd be dead by now." He snapped his fingers. Nothing happened. "Huh. Usually I can kill things with that."

"You're in a human body, now," Dipper reminded him.

Bill sighed. "Sad, but true."

"Stop changing the subject. Dipper hovered a little closer. "What do you want with my body?"

"Wouldn't you like to know." Bill smiled sweetly.

"And why didn't you destroy the journal and that laptop when you had the chance? I mean," Dipper shrugged in frustration. "You still have the chance! And you said I was too close to finding answers, so why are you letting me-"

"Slow down there, kiddo."

"You can't tell me-"

"Oh, yes I can."

Dipper stopped short. Bill cocked his head to the side, regarding Dipper for a moment before grinning.

"You might have forgotten, but I've got control over your body, now." He righted his head. "And that means that if you step one little intangible toe out of line…" He grabbed Dipper's right pinky finger and snapped it back. "Oh- oh, yes, that's good." Biting his lip, Bill dropped Dipper's hand. "Get the picture?"

Dipper, who was staring at his body's broken pinky finger mournfully, nodded. "I… what do you want?"

"Telling you would ruin all the fun, wouldn't it?" Bill grabbed the stack of papers, shivered, and brought his right hand away. "Oh, look at that- it's all bent and everything!"

"You can't just- Bill, tell me what you mean, that's not fair!" Dipper demanded.

"Oh, go throw your 'life's not fair' tantrum back in the attic." Bill waved Dipper away, still grinning madly. "I've got to put these up before dark, remember?"

"But-"

"Pine Tree. _Go._"

"You can't-"

"Go, or I'll dislocate your shoulder."

Well, that settled it. Dipper reluctantly made his way up and out of the trees, mourning the loss of his body now more than ever. Now what was he supposed to do?

o0O0o

"He doesn't have any of his demonic powers anymore- he tried to do some spell or something, but it didn't work because it was in my body, and I'm just a human."

"So what do we do?"

"I don't know. He has control of my body, remember? So if he doesn't like what I'm doing, then he can just break one of my bones. If he knows we're trying to figure out a way to get me back in my body, then he'll… I don't know what he'll do." Dipper tried his best to make the sock puppet look worried. "Mabel, he knows- or he thinks he knows- that I took this sock puppet. So he thinks that you know about him, even if he hasn't shown it yet. I have a plan."

"Another list-y thing?" Mabel guessed. "How do you even make one of those if you can't hold a pen?"

"No!" Dipper shook the sock puppet in frustration. "Look, just… trust me."

"Trust you? That sounds like something you say when you have a really stupid plan."

…

"Dipper, you're a genius!"

"Of course I am. That's why he took over the body with _my _brain in it."

"Doof." Mabel swatted the puppet. "I'll do it at my sleepover tomorrow night at Grenda's." She smiled at the thought of her friends, before remembering what they were talking about. "So did you figure out what he wants?"

"No." Dipper sank a little. "I haven't got a clue. I know he wants _something. _But… apart from that, I've got nothing to go on."

"Maybe he's just lonely." Mabel shrugged. "You never know."

"I… Mabel, I really don't think that's the case."

o0O0o

"Dipper! Come up, come up, I gotta show you something!" Mabel tugged on Dipper's arm and Bill made a small grunt as he was jerked backwards very suddenly.

"Come up?" he repeated.

"To the attic- come _on, _Dipper!" Mabel dragged Dipper's body up the stairs- Bill seemed determined to inflict as much pain as he could to himself, and knocked Dipper's ankles on each step.

"All right, all right," Bill said, as they finally reached the top. "What do you have to show me so badly?"

"I found it!" Mabel announced, reaching under her pillow and procuring the Mabel puppet. She shook it in the air proudly. "I knew it had to be around here somewhere!"

Bill looked at the puppet, and Dipper thought he saw the faintest trace of astonishment before it was hurriedly replaced with what could only be described as triumph. He grabbed it from Mabel's hands and inspected it carefully, tossing it from one hand to the next.

"The one surviving puppet, huh?" He grinned.

"I thought you could help me get rid of it," Mabel continued, taking the puppet back.

"Get rid of it?"

"Yeah." Mabel plopped down onto her bed, letting the puppet fall into her lap. "I mean, I only made the puppets because of Gabe and I… I ditched you because of Gabe and the puppet show and everything and- we can get rid of this last puppet together and it'll be my way of saying I'm sorry." Mabel gave her brother a hopeful look.

Bill didn't seem to know what to do to this. He took a moment or two to process, before nodding.

"Yeah, all right. We can burn it."

"Perfect! And then the googly eyes can get all melty." Mabel tossed the puppet in the air. "Besides, puppets are creepy."

"Sister mine, you have no idea."

Floating between the floors, listening intently, Dipper smiled.

o0O0o

"I told you not to add sparkles."

"You never said that! And hey, you look fabulous."

"I look stupid."

"You looked stupid before. Now you look stupid but stylish at the same time."

"Mabel."

"_I _think the sparkles are amazing."

"You need to take them off."

Dipper shook the sock puppet, and nearly a quarter cup of glitter fell to the forest floor.

"Hey, at least I made your dumb sock puppet."

"It's not dumb! You said it yourself, Mabel, I'm a genius."

"A genius who doesn't like sparkles."

"_Mabel._"

"So now what?"

"Uh-" Dipper was slightly thrown aback by the change of topic. "I don't know. Find out what Bill wants?"

"How are we gonna do that?"

"I don't know, Mabel!" Dipper gesticulated a little too wildly and the puppet stuck itself in a bush. He yanked it out. Another quarter cup of glitter dusted the ground. "I don't know, all right? I don't know why Bill's here, I don't know why he's in my body, I don't know why he won't let me know anything. I don't. Know."

Mabel sighed. Dipper held the puppet loosely, oscillating up and down as he breathed.

"I'm sorry." Mabel scratched her neck. "I know you don't know. I just thought… you always have these great ideas and plans and everything."

"We'll figure this out," Dipper promised. "Somehow. Bill's not getting away with whatever it is."

"How do you know that?"

"Hey. We beat Gideon, didn't we? How bad can an isosceles triangle be?"

Mabel giggled.

"Seriously, though, get rid of the glitter. It's too eye catching."

Mabel nodded. "Yeah, yeah, I get it. One boring sock puppet coming up. I'll make this one _next _sleepover."

"Which is…?"

"Tomorrow night."

Dipper made the puppet nod. "Make sure Bill never finds this. Actually, no, I will. I'll put it in the lake."

"Ooh, disposing of the evidence?" Mabel beamed. "I've always wanted to be a serial killer!"

"…No, you haven't." Dipper sighed. "Just make sure Bill doesn't find out, okay?"

"Got it."

Dipper set the puppet down, and Mabel turned to go back to the Shack.

"Wait, Mabel."

Mabel spun on her heel. "Yeah?"

"Look, I… this is my fault," Dipper said, unable to look Mabel in the eyes even though he knew she wouldn't be able to look back at him. "I made that deal in the first place-and I made this one. I should have thought, I should have realized he was tricking me. But I didn't. So. I'm sorry. And if we get out of this mess in one piece, then I'll try to be a better brother to you than I've been."

"Oh, Dipper."

"And apologizing doesn't make everything okay, blah blah blah." Dipper shook the puppet's head. "I know."

"Dipper, stop it. You're being all sad and stuff and you don't need to be."

"I'm not being _sad._"

"You're being sad." Mabel crossed her arms. "And you don't need to be. It wasn't your fault, Dipper. It's Bill's. And if it's anyone else's, it's mine."

Dipper sighed. "I guess we're both at fault?"

"I guess we are."

"So we're even."

"Even Stevens."

"Good."


	4. Chapter 4

Four days and one sock puppet later, Dipper couldn't take it anymore.

"He hasn't done _anything! _I've been following him around, you've been following him around when I'm not there- he hasn't done a single thing out of line. _And,_" Dipper added, cutting off Mabel even as she opened her mouth to interject, "we're still no closer to getting me back in my own body."

"He's been sleeping and eating and stuff," Mabel agreed, shivering a little in the chill of the night air. Dipper was grateful for the first time that he lacked the ability to feel anything, as the breeze swirling through the trees didn't look particularly warm. "There's no way he's gonna just collapse from exhaustion like last time."

"I told you, Mabel. You have to knock him out."

"And I told _you. _I'm not hitting you, Dipper." Mabel shoved her hands into the sweater's front pocket.

"It's fine, it'll just be a bruise." Dipper shook the puppet's head, trying to make it seem assuring.

"And it's not like he's doing anything bad with your body," Mabel added.

"We don't know that!"

"You're worrying too much, Dipper."

"Mabel!" Dipper shoved the puppet in her face. "I'm talking to you with a sock puppet because _my body's _been_ possessed _bythesamedemonthattriedto_ take over our uncle's mind." _With each emphasis, he rubbed the puppet on her face. "I am _not_ _worrying too much_!"

"Sheesh, okay, okay." Mabel swatted the puppet away. "Seriously though, Dipper. I'm not hitting you on the head. What if it doesn't work?"

"I mean. I don't know." Dipper considered this. If it didn't work and Mabel appeared to have just tried to knock her own brother out, then what? "Just pass it off as a Mabel thing you do?"

"I don't just go around hitting people!" Mabel crossed her arms, very offended.

"Fine. Then make it look like an accident."

"Ugh, but that's so much _work._" Mabel collapsed backwards on the rock she was perched on, laying her arms open and limp.

"We have to force him unconscious somehow, Mabel! Do you not get this?"

"I'll challenge him to a no-sleeping contest to see who passes out first?"

"You always lose those."

"True."

They both pondered the situation at hand.

"Couldn't we just ask him?" Mabel suggested, sitting up.

"You think I haven't tried that?"

"I mean, we could force him to talk- I tickled him, remember?"

"What? That doesn't make any sense. Force him to talk by threatening to tickle him? Mabel, are you serious?"

"It could totally work! He was terrified- what did he call them? 'Body spasms' or something?" Mabel shrugged. "If we threatened him with body spasms, I bet he'd talk."

"I mean." Dipper thought about it. Bill didn't know a thing about the human body besides that it needed sleep and food, so they did have the upper hand. "We could take him by surprise," he added. "After all, he doesn't know you know it's really him."

"But what if we don't know that he knows that we know that he doesn't know- because he actually does know?" Mabel cut in, chewing her lip.

Dipper stopped to run Mabel's sentence in his head a few times before realizing what she was saying. "But… he can't know- we burned that puppet."

"He might know we made another one, and he's just pretending not to know." Mabel plopped down on a rock, grabbing her hair. "Augh, it's so confusing!"

"We'll just have to assume that he doesn't know," Dipper said, bringing the puppet down to her eye level. "And, I mean, we have nothing else to go on, now. We'll try your idea, and if that doesn't work, then you'll knock him unconscious."

"I… fine." Mabel nodded. "When?"

"Tonight."

o0O0o

The evening was hot.

Moonlight covered the grass, casting ghostlike shadows behind everything it touched. The trees glowed almost blue, keeping the forest floor dark with the canopy of leaves. The occasional gust of wind forced one to sway, and then another, and soon the whole forest was dancing to the song, pine needles dropping, leaves rustling, branches aching.

The wind song was the only noise.

Dipper hovered over the tips of the trees, watching and waiting. Nights had become boring, what with the loss of sleep. As he was no longer attached to a human body, Dipper had no reason to rest. He spent the nights entertaining himself, trying to puzzle out what Bill was planning. This night would be no different.

"Who wants a lamby, lamby, lamby," Dipper muttered to himself, making the sock puppet bounce with each word. "I do, I do."

That stupid dance. At least it had proved good for something in the end. And at least he hadn't been stuck in the dumb lamb costume after the whole thing.

"So go up and greet your mammy, mammy, mammy," he continued, putting the slightest hint of a melody to go with the words. "Hi there, hi there."

An owl answered him- one long hoot, two short, one long. One long hoot, two short, two long.

Dipper followed the sound deeper into the woods before ducking beneath the canopy. Mabel was sat on a rock, legs crossed, looking very pleased with herself. Directly across from here was a tree about as tall as the Mystery Shack, with Dipper's body tied firmly to it. Bill stared at Mabel angrily- or perhaps it was anxiously. Dipper couldn't tell.

"I think you went overboard there with the rope," he commented, bringing the puppet down to Mabel's level. He glared at Bill, who looked as though he was using a large amount of will power not to begin laughing at the sight of Dipper trying to look threatening with a sock puppet.

"You can never be too careful," Mabel said, with her wisest voice. "Hey, guess what owl that was!"

"Uh," said Dipper. "I… don't know?"

"A Barred owl!"

"That's great."

"See, it's a _real _owl call. I went to the library and got a book and everything-"

"Mabel, that's great, but aren't we supposed to be doing something else?" Dipper shoved the puppet in the direction of the tree, which was still harboring an amused looking Bill.

"Oh, right! Yeah, we're gonna torture you," Mabel said, pointing threateningly at Bill.

"I'm terrified." Bill rolled his eyes.

"Oh, just you wait." Dipper crossed his arms. "You're going to tell us why you're here, or we're going to torture you."

"With what?" Bill was severely unimpressed.

"Body spasms," Mabel hissed, in her most dramatic voice. "And not just that. You don't know a thing about the human body, but I do. You don't know what I can do to you, do you?" Mabel asked, smugly.

Bill seemed to remember the last time he'd experienced such a thing, as he tugged a little harder at the ropes, demeanor changing in an instant.

"That's right," Mabel continued, sensing she'd struck gold. "There are a million things I can do to you, mister triangle. And body spasms are just the beginning!"

Bill was frantically struggling against the tree, looking down at the ropes and trying to figure out how to untangle himself. It was a startling change of character- Dipper hadn't seen Bill appear out of control like this since they'd tried to fight against him inside Stan's mind. It was almost too disturbing to look at.

"On second thought," Dipper said, turning to Mabel, "I take it back. You were right with the ropes."

"So. Ready to tell us?" Mabel prompted. Bill slumped, falling limp against the ropes. They waited, but he didn't speak.

"Looks like he isn't talking," Dipper decided. "Mabel, you know what to do."

"_No!_" Bill pressed himself up against the tree as Mabel approached, hands posed menacingly. "Fine, yeesh- I'll tell you, I'll tell you, just- keep away from me!"

"Not such a being of pure energy when you're trapped inside a human's body, are you?" Dipper gloated. "All right, Mabel, that's enou- _that's enough._"

Mabel, who was hovering over Bill, hands poised above his neck, pouted.

"Why did you take my body?"

"Because I wanted a body," Bill said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"Why?"

"I told you, kid. It's been a long time since I've inhabited a body. I missed it."

"You were a human once?"

"I've possessed humans before, Pine Tree." Bill frowned. "None of them were as stubborn as you, though."

"Why are you here?"

"I was summoned."

"You know what I mean."

"You'll have to be more specific."

"What do you want?"

"Not to be tied up to a tree?"

"Mabel," Dipper commanded, crossing his arms and not taking his eyes off of Bill's.

Mabel touched a finger to Dipper's neck and wiggled it gently. Bill let out a cry of anguish, writhing against the tree. The sound was… actually, it was kind of awful. Even after having been pushed out of his own body and tricked and lied to, even after promising himself he'd get revenge, thinking about nothing but plans for getting Bill to talk, getting even with him… Even after all of that, hearing him scream was painful.

"Stop, _STOP-_I'm here because- because-" Bill stuttered, wincing and scrabbling against the tree as Mabel continued to tickle him. With a nod of the puppet, she stopped.

"Because you 'like me'? Yeah, that's what you said last time." Dipper, unable to look Bill fully in the eyes, resorted instead to looking at his sister as spoke. "And look where that's gotten us."

"No, you- I'm here because I don't have anywhere else to be."

Mabel stepped back and sat down on the rock again, regarding Bill suspiciously. "What do you mean?" she asked. "Where are you when you're not here, then?"

"The mindscape's a pretty empty place," Bill admitted. "No one can hear me, really. Not unless they're dreaming or I'm directly summoned."

Mabel and Dipper stared. Bill looked at the ground, seemingly defeated.

"So, let me get this straight," Dipper said, slowly. "You… you came here and took over my body because you're _lonely?_"

"That's not a nice word for it," Bill retorted, looking back up at Dipper.

"But what about those 'big plans' you were talking about? You wanted to destroy my journal!"

"You were getting close to answers. To finding the author."

"The author's alive?"

"Maybe. Maybe just the spirit's left, now." Bill shrugged as best he could under the ropes. "Either way, the author's not a big fan of me."

"Yeah, I kinda got that." Dipper remembered the pages smeared in blood, the warnings against trusting the demon.

"And if you banished me," Bill continued, "then I'd be out of Gravity Falls. Maybe even for good, who knows?"

"You don't want to go," Dipper realized.

"Of course I don't want to go!" Bill looked incredulous that Dipper had only just come to this conclusion. "I can make people see me here, I can see time passing here, it's- fascinating. I can talk to people, I can see things happen. I can go into people's minds, I can change things, and I can watch them change." Bill stared at the sky as if it would give him the answers he was looking for. "Of course I want to stay."

Bill sighed, head falling again. The ropes pulled against the tree, which stood and held against his weight.

"So you're really not here to hurt us?" Mabel asked, tentatively. "Really?"

"No!" Bill slammed Dipper's head against the tree in frustration. "I told you once, I've told you a thousand times. If I wanted to hurt you, I'd be dead. I don't want anything from you two, how long is it going to take you to realize that?"

"Give it… forty seconds," Mabel estimated.

"You put me in a cast," Dipper pointed out. "I think that counts as hurting me."

"Eh, like I said. Pain is hilarious."

"Seriously?"

"You try living for hundreds of thousands of years- well, maybe not _hundreds _of thousands, I'm exaggerating- without a single sensory input."

"I… fair enough, I guess." It wasn't true, it couldn't be. Bill wouldn't just be here because he was lonely- there had to be some ulterior motive.

Right?

"Done!" Mabel chimed in. "It's realized. Can't un-realize it now. Realized forever."

"You're just gonna trust him." Dipper stared at his sister, puppet still in hand. "I don't believe this."

"Dipper, he's lonely!" Mabel pouted. "How would you feel if you were in his place?"

"But I'm not in his place, Mabel, that's the point. I'm not in my body, _he is._

"I have to give you two props, though," Bill cut in, from where he was still resolutely tied to the tree. "I didn't know you thought to make another puppet. Clever, Pine Tree. You stole it first, then clued sister dearest in. And then 'found' it again and made sure I watched while you destroyed it- but not after you made another puppet to talk with, hmm?"

Dipper nodded. The sock puppet perched on his hand did the same.

"You really didn't know."

"Nope." Bill smiled. "You're not completely useless, after all."

"Um. I." Dipper looked anywhere but the tree. "Thanks."

"So?" Mabel said, poking the puppet. "What now?"

"I guess we just… untie him."

"But what about you? We were supposed to get you back in your body."

"You'll get your body back eventually," Bill added, from the tree. "I promise."

"You've lied before."

"I mean. A little. But then I made up for it, fair and square. Didn't I?"

"I… guess." Dipper wasn't wholly convinced. "You promise? I'll get my body back by the end of the summer?"

"Give it a couple weeks, kid."

"And you won't damage it too much?"

"Yeah, yeah, I won't break it."

"I don't trust you," Dipper added, before he said anything else. "Just putting that out there."

"Of course you don't."

"But," he cut in, "we're going to set you free." He made the puppet nod to Mabel, who sprung up immediately and hurried to the back of the tree.

"That's great and all, but can it wait another minute? My leg's almost completely fallen asleep and it feels _amazing._"

o0O0o

It was much easier to get through the day without having to hide the puppet.

He still had to keep Stan and the others from seeing it, of course, but now he could talk to Mabel whenever he liked.

"I'm still worried," he admitted to Mabel, as she brushed her teeth. "I don't trust him, Mabel."

Mabel spat into the sink and looked at the reflection of the sock puppet in the mirror. "Ugh, Dipper, can't you just let it go? So he took over your body-"

"He's still taking over my body, I don't know if you've noticed."

"So he's taking over your body." Mabel shrugged. "Same difference. He's not hurting you."

"He kind of is."

"_Dipper._" Mabel washed the toothbrush under the tap. "I told you, you worry too much. I trust him." She rinsed her mouth, gargled, and spat again. "And besides, what can he do?"

"Break my body completely?" Dipper offered. "Or, you know, completely ruin my relationship with- uh- everyone else."

Mabel stared. "_That's _what you're worried about?"

"No, I mean-that's not-"

"Wendy? You want to be back in your body just so that you can still talk to _Wendy_?" Mabel giggled.

"No!" Dipper ground his teeth in frustration. "Look, I- he acts weird around everyone else, not just Wendy. I saw him when he was at the puppet show, before all that stuff… happened."

"You were acting weird, okay," Mabel admitted. "But I thought you were just really tired."

"Not the point, Mabel." Dipper sighed. "He was talking to Wendy and Soos and Grunkle Stan and it was all wrong and- and I don't want them to think I'm..."

"A little different?" Mabel sighed. "Dipper, they've known you this long. Just because you're acting weird for a little while doesn't mean they won't still like you like normal." Mabel frowned. "And anyway, Bill hasn't talked to people in, like, forever! And you want him to stop just because you're worried that people won't like you as much?"

"Maybe… maybe I am being kind of selfish." He sank a little, the puppet coming to rest on the bathroom counter. "Maybe you're right."

"Of course I am." Mabel didn't seem put off by Dipper's change in demeanor in the slightest. "You're just being paranoid. He's a good guy, I can feel it."

"Shut up, no you can't."

"Totally can."

The sound of their bickering carried out through the cracked window and over on the wind, brushing tree tops, caressing branches, passing birds before swirling up into the night air and disintegrating. In the attic, Mabel returned to her bed. On the roof, Dipper sat and waited for the sun to return. In Dipper's bed, Bill smiled to himself, glad that he was finally getting what he wanted.

And above the shack, the moon began its descent.


	5. Chapter 5

Since there was no longer a need for her to hide it, Mabel kept Dipper's new sock puppet in her sweater pocket wherever she went. This, of course, meant that Dipper was free to talk with her whenever he wanted, and he although he was relieved to be able to talk to his sister again, he realized after almost a day that he'd taken for granted how much of a blessing _not_ having to talk to Mabel had been.

"But I don't get it. Candy and Grenda have been friends for, like, the entire summer. And even before that! So something like this shouldn't be bothering them, right? I mean, I've seen them fight before, sometimes, but that's always over dumb stuff and they always make up- oh, speaking of makeup, Grenda wants to try this new thing called contouring, but I don't know if she'll be okay with it, but I mean Candy's probably pretty good because she wears makeup all the time so she'd know about it, right? But since they're not talking to each other, I don't know if Grenda'll be able to do it because she- no, no, that's mean to say, I just mean- I want the best for her, you know, because she's my friend, and-"

"Pine Tree, make it _stop,_" Bill pleaded, fingers twitching around his fork. Mabel, who was cutting her pancakes into neat little triangles, didn't appear to hear him, still babbling nervously.

"Welcome to being Dipper Pines," Dipper said, shrugging as he hovered over the table. The sock puppet was in Mabel's sweater pocket, so he didn't have to worry about Mabel hearing him. "Enjoy your stay."

"This is _torture._"

"-but then she didn't even say goodbye! And I don't get it! Has she got some sort of a boyfriend or something? I didn't see any guys around this week when we went out." Mabel paused for breath, taking the moment to spear a stack of pancake slices and munch on them moodily.

"I thought being a human was supposed to be fun; this is- this is- this isn't pain, this is horrible! How do you stand it?"

"Oh, sure." Dipper folded his arms. "You like being stabbed in the arm with forks but you can't take a little bit of listening to girls talk about their problems. You know, I'm starting to doubt just how much of an omnipotent demon you are, Bill."

"Ugh." Bill poked the small stack of pancakes on his plate, cut one into an experimental grid of rectangles, and selected a single section with his fork. He stuffed the section of pancake into his mouth and chewed it slowly, evaluating. He swallowed the section, thought for a moment, and shrugged. "Acceptable."

"No, but I haven't even gotten into the worst part," Mabel pressed on, hunger seemingly sated for now. "I asked Candy what was wrong between them, and you know what she said? She said 'Grenda knows what she has to apologize for'. I mean, come on! I _talked _to Grenda! And she doesn't know what's wrong! It's like they had this giant lapse of communication; I don't get it! They're usually so tight knit-"

"Work!" Bill shouted, standing and slamming a hand on the table. "Let's go do work. Come on, Pine Tree. What does Glasses make you do around here?"

And so Dipper showed Bill around the Shack, taking care not to give away too much. Of course Bill already knew about the attic, and about the general layout of the building, but who knew what other secrets the Shack was hiding?

"And these are the cleaning supplies. This is what I usually do. Uh, in the mornings, the afternoons, and at night, I have to clean the floors. It's usually not a problem. But, I mean, occasionally some kid'll throw up and then I'll have to clean that. But it's mostly just dust and stuff." He picked up the mop. "Ever seen one of these before?"

Bill made a 'tsk' sound, looking at the mop in an air of supreme authority. "Of _course_ I have. You think me, the _Master of the Mind_, has never seen a… that?"

"You have no idea what it is, do you?"

"It looks dangerous. Is it dangerous? Do you stick it somewhere?"

"_No. _I- look." Dipper pinched the bridge of his nose. "You get a bucket of warm water and soap, and then you dip that part in, and then you mop the floors. That's it. No… sticking."

"Oh, boring." Bill looked severely disappointed that the mop didn't appear to have any lethal qualities about it.

"Sorry to disappoint you, O Being of Supreme Evil." Dipper rolled his eyes.

And to his surprise, Bill laughed.

It wasn't a mocking laugh, nor was it one that instinctually raised Dipper's suspicion. No, this was a laugh that Dipper knew was genuine.

"Oh, Pine Tree. You've got a ways to go. Evil's a pretty broad topic, you know. You can make the case for most things being evil. Me, your uncle, this town. Even you."

"I'm not evil!"

"That's what they all say."

o0O0o

It was nearly bedtime.

What little moonlight that shone on the Shack was blocked by its walls. The stairs leading to the attic were stagnant, with no weight to creak under. The television droned, sending flickers of light up onto the walls before drawing it back in.

"This week, Ducktective faces his greatest challenge yet- the return of his nemesis, Tainted Dove."

"Seen it."

The television hiccupped, the light dimmed from neon characters into a carefully lit room.

"Boring."

The colors exploded into an array of blue and red, trumpeting music soaring through the speakers.

"From Gravity Falls's newsroom, our top story today: the Gravity Falls library has been the victim of a rather unusual break-in."

The television coughed, screen collapsing.

"No, no, no, go back, go back!"

"Yeesh, Shooting Star, do you ever make up your mind?"

Mabel grabbed the remote control and smashed the right button, switching the channel back to the previous show.

"-thing was taken, and none of the books were entirely destroyed, leaving the town's police baffled," the reporter reported, clearly reading off of a prompter. An image of the aforementioned books obscured her face. One of the books was closed, bearing its cover, which had a delicately cut out hole where the title had once been. The book next to it was open, bearing the first inner inch or so of the pages, but no more.

"What…?" Dipper, attention caught, squinted at the screen.

"The suspect left no clues as to his or her identification," the reporter read, as the camera shot of the books rotated slowly. "Investigations are currently being held as to why this crime has been committed. In the meantime, the Gravity Falls library is planning on restocking its inventory by the end of this month."

"So someone broke into some building." Bill shrugged, as the television talked about the library's future plans. "So what?"

"Yeah, but who?" Dipper forced the sock puppet in front of the TV screen. "And why? They didn't take anything, so… what was the point?"

"Attention," Bill supplied easily. "I've seen this before. Human wants to get noticed, human doesn't want to get caught." He snatched the remote from Mabel's hand and lowered the volume. "Human news is boring."

"But this is different!" Dipper crossed his arms. "We should investigate. What if it's not a person who's doing this?"

"Did you see those books? That had to be done by hand," Mabel countered, shaking her head. "It was definitely a person."

"Still, I don't like it. We should figure out what's going on."

"I dunno, Dipper. Maybe the police can handle it."

"Those two?" Bill laughed. "They couldn't find their way out of a house if you showed them the door."

"Mabel, they believed you when you said Stan was a crime fiction writer. They're not gonna catch this guy- or this thing, whichever it is." Dipper, who was gradually getting used to mimicking his gestures with the sock puppet, rocked his hand back and forth as he shook his head. "What if this is something bigger?"

"Like what? Some mysterious monster that eats books but leaves the crusts? Dipper, come on."

"Hey, I don't know!" Dipper slid the sock puppet over so it was facing his sister. "Mabel, your first boyfriend was a bunch of gnomes trying to get you to marry them. Right now, I'm a _sock puppet. _If you don't already think that anything's possible in this town, then I don't know what to tell you."

"All right, all right," Mabel conceded. "Point taken. But still, we don't have a lot to go on."

"But we have to investigate-"

"Quiet, Pine Tree."

Bill stood from the couch, remote in hand. With the flick of his thumb, the television switched off.

"Why are you so keen on this whole 'adventure' thing, anyway?" he asked, turning to Dipper. "I get that you're curious, but there are a million and six things in this town that you could spend your time on."

"It's gotten a lot of press?" Dipper shrugged. "It seems pretty important."

"Press. That's what you care about."

"And, well. You know. It might be a good way for you to. Um." Dipper picked at his transparent fingernails. "Experience the human body? While you're here."

A tense silence followed this, in which Dipper restated the last thing he'd said in his head a few times and Bill merely blinked, one eye at a time. Mabel, sat on the couch beside Bill, looked between the sock puppet and the demon.

"I mean, uh. If you want to be a human, you may as well have an adventure-thing, right? Solve a mystery? I mean, it's what I do all the time."

"I know you do, kid, I've seen you."

"Wait a minute!" Mabel popped into the conversation, apparently no longer worried about butting in. "Bill, you know everything, right?"

"I-"

"So you know what's behind this weird break-in thing, right?"

"If you'd let me finish a sentence, I might tell you." Bill crossed his legs, defensively. "I _knew _most things. Or I had the power to. But since I'm stuck in this meatsack- which I'm not leaving anytime soon- I don't. So no, I don't know who's behind this."

"Or what's behind this," Dipper reminded him.

"_Or what's behind this,_" Bill reluctantly agreed. "But Pine Tree has a point." He stood from the couch and cracked Dipper's knuckles with a grin. "Come on, Shooting Star. We've got a mystery to solve."

o0O0o

The library, as they expected, was covered with police tape. It looked like the only two officers on the scene were Blubs and Durland, and as they were engrossed in some sort of card game in their car, it didn't look like it was going to be too difficult to sneak inside and have a look around.

"I still don't see why we hafta do this," Mabel whispered, as she clambered through the window, joining the other two inside the library. "They showed enough pictures of the library on TV."

"I want a closer look," Dipper decided, floating past the shelves. The library was empty, apart from the three of them. The shelves, which were normally perfectly organized, were in a state of disarray. Ruined books littered the floor. Only a few empty covers remained on the shelves. The lights, which had always lit up the various nooks and crannies, were off, giving the whole place an uneasy feeling. Dipper passed by one shelf, turned, and stopped. "Hold on- look at this." He looked at the end of the first shelf, on front of which was a poster promoting children to read. But where the word 'READ' had once been was an elliptical hole.

"So it's not just the books," Bill mused.

"Come on, let's see what else we can find." Dipper, holding the sock puppet aloft, drifted through the library, looking for anything else that had been damaged.

The front desk was mostly fine. The cash register wasn't opened, and when Mabel pressed her fingers to the buttons, the drawer slid out, cash still present. They passed by the fireplace, which was unlit but otherwise untouched, and by the kid's table, which still had its collection of picture books, puzzles, and stuffed toys.

"Dipper, look!" Mabel rushed over to the kids' table. She held a stuffed tiger aloft. "The tag's been torn off. Oh, you poor thing." She clutched the animal to her chest. "Someone's mistreated you, haven't they?"

"Mabel, put that thing down," Dipper hissed. "We don't have much time- and the officers could come in here any minute!"

"Oh, please." Bill leaned on one of the bookshelves, wholly uninterested in the search for clues. "They won't come out of that car for at _least _an hour."

"Oh, you wanna bet?" Dipper frowned, turning on Bill, who wasn't being particularly hepful.

"Kid, don't try. You'll end up eating your words."

"Eating my- wait a minute!" Dipper frowned, then soared down to the ground where one of the ruined flyers was lying. "Bill, that's it! You're a genius!"

"Course I am, Pine Tree, what's your point?" Bill strode over to Dipper, who was inspecting the flyer with narrowed eyes.

The hole wasn't a clear cut after all- it was made of tiny irregular markings. Considering all the other things that happened routinely in Gravity Falls, it really wasn't all that unlikely.

"You said it yourself- 'eat your words'," Dipper continued, proudly. "Look at this poster- that's not a cut out hole. Someone- or something- _ate the words._"

"Let me see that." Mabel held the poster up to an imaginary light, squinting.

"Something's been eating the paper?" she repeated, handing the page back to Bill.

"Not just the paper," Dipper said, shaking his head. "It ate the tag off that stuffed animal, remember?"

"So what are we dealing with? A creature that can eat words?" Bill asked, cocking his head to the side.

"The journal might know something about that," Dipper concluded. He looked accusingly at Bill, who shrugged.

"Hey, I didn't destroy it, Pine Tree. Or don't you remember?" he sneered, tossing the poster to the ground.

Mabel, holding the tiger, looked worriedly at the door. "Dipper-"

A sudden sound made them all jump, quieting instantly and turning towards the source of the noise. Behind the main door, two voices were approaching. They were faint, but getting louder by the second.

"It's them!" Mabel whispered, fear struck. She raced to the kids' table, retrieved the stuffed animal, and hurried to the window.

"Mabel, wait-" It was too late. Before Dipper could finish, Mabel had climbed out of the side window and out onto the grass.

"Bill, quick, take that poster and grab another book from the shelf," Dipper ordered, watching the front door warily.

"Why should I?" Bill retorted, folding his arms and standing in place. "Human jail might be interesting."

"Do you want to get to the bottom of this mystery or not?" Dipper didn't bother making the sock puppet move- if Bill was the only one who could hear him, then he might as well yell. "Come _on!_"

"I don't see why I should care."

"Come on, Bill, please! If there really is a word eating creature out there, then it could destroy the journal," he pointed out. "I can't let that get eaten- or whatever. Please, Bill."

Bill said nothing to this, staring instead at something Dipper couldn't see. He blinked twice, frozen in place. Behind them, the door moved on its hinges. Two voices echoed from just outside.

"You was countin' cards," Durland was saying, accusingly.

"I was not!" Blubs retorted, sounding very offended.

"_Bill!_"

Without another word, Bill grabbed a book off the end of the shelf and the poster that Mabel had dropped. He scrambled behind the shelf and out the window, just as the two officers made it inside the library.

Dipper slipped the sock puppet through the window and used it to slide the glass down and shut.

Mabel was on her back on the grass, stuffed tiger on her chest. Bill stood beside her, seemingly deep in thought.

"Phew," Mabel sighed, eyes closed. "I'm glad we got out of there okay."

"Let's get back to the Shack," Bill said tersely. "Come on, Shooting Star." He didn't wait for Mabel to stand before he began walking back to the car. Being a demon that had lived for thousands of whatever-s of years, cars weren't all that intimidating. And as much as Dipper had hated to admit it, Bill was the only one between the three of them that knew somewhat how to drive.

"Woah, woah, woah, hold on. Wait." Dipper folded his arms, gliding alongside Bill. "Why are you suddenly so…" He trailed off, not entirely sure which adjective would describe Bill's sudden new personality best.

"I'm not suddenly so anything, Pine Tree."

"Yeah, you are! Like, a minute ago you didn't even want to move, and now you're all anxious to get back." Dipper frowned. "It was because I mentioned the journal, wasn't it?"

Mabel hopped into the passenger seat, still holding the stuffed tiger. Dipper sighed, slipping into the seat beside her. As long as he kept the puppet mimicking his actions, the car would carry him, too.

"Look, kid." Bill backed out of the library parking lot and joined the road, heading back to the Shack. The road was lit only by the streetlamps and the faint glow of the moon. "Why do you think I didn't destroy that book when I had the chance? You _want _it. It's _leverage. _And if those things eat it, then it'll be gone."

"I should have guessed." Dipper rolled his eyes. "It's all about you, isn't it?" He sighed. "But I guess we both want the same thing this time, right?"

"Unfortunately."

"So we're gonna have to work together."

"Kid, what-"

"So I have to trust you."

"Oh, Pine Tree, I didn't know you cared." Bill swerved the car to the edge of the road and back. Mabel's head smacked into the side window.

"OW!" she yelped, holding the tiger to the side of her head.

"Hey, stop that!" Dipper made the sock puppet pat her head gently. "Bill- okay, fine. If you don't want to solve this mystery, then fine. Mabel and I can do it on our own."

"Of course I want to solve your mystery- all part of being human!" Bill grinned. "Hey, do you think the airbags would hit hard enough to leave a mark if I crashed the car into a tree?"


	6. Chapter 6

The book was still hiding under the TV when the three of them returned to the Shack, and Dipper spent most of the night leafing through the pages as Bill and Mabel slept upstairs. It was a little difficult to navigate through a book with nothing but a sock puppet to turn the pages, but Dipper managed.

He'd passed through nearly the whole thing when he came across a page by the end of the book. The edge of the page wasn't smooth, as most of the other pages were. Instead, it was torn in some places; a few of the words scribbled hastily at the end of the page were gone.

"Dynocians," he read aloud, scanning the page. The title was written in clear black lines, with a little embellishment at the end of the last 's'. However, the rest of the page was written hastily, as if the writer hadn't had much time left. In the center there was a detailed drawing of what looked like an insect- it had the general makings of a winged ant, but instead of its front legs, it carried a set of pincers that had very precisely drawn barbs. They almost looked like teeth.

"Dynocians, as I have decided upon myself to call them, are insects that I have only encountered in Gravity Falls. I must conclude that the strange powers about this place have caused their existence, and I plan to study them further," Dipper read, following the black ink across the page. It still appeared unmarred and controlled. Dipper skipped down to the next paragraph. "After further inspection, I have determined the main source of diet for these creatures- words."

So it was a word eating bug, after all. Dipper thought back to the ruined flyer and book. They really had been teeth marks? Weird.

"So far," the author continued, "I have managed to keep them at bay by merely writing nonsense sentences on spare pages and leaving them in the forest for the creatures to find. Unless provoked, they are harmless. I managed to capture one on my last attempt. I have illustrated it below."

An arrow pointed down from the paragraph to the picture of the insect. Whoever the author was, he or she was a very talented artist, Dipper noted.

"After another investigation, I have determined that these creatures will consume letters as well as words. Their jaws are strong and sharp; they can bite through nearly all forms of protection I have placed around the words. Without seeing them, these creatures can sense their presence and will attack. I have managed to keep this journal intact by keeping loose pages of words on me at all times."

So they'd have to write up a page of nonsense and copy it a hundred or so times to keep the creatures at bay? That didn't seem so hard. Or they could just bring old books and save the trouble of writing anything at all. Cool. He jumped to the other paragraph, which was decidedly messier.

"Along with the ability to sense words without sight, these creatures have highly advanced adaptable skills. After getting used to my free handouts, they repopulated and mutated further. They seem determined to consume my journal and if I don't stop them, I fear they may."

The edge of the page was ripped and torn; Dipper had a bad feeling about these creatures, now.

"By analyzing their biological structure, I can only guess as to their nature," Dipper read, frowning. "As they look nearly exactly like ants, I hypothesize that they are of a hive mind. The only solution would to then be to destroy the Queen of this hive. The ones that attack me are but the workers, I can only conclude. The safest thing I can do now is to hide this journal away where they cannot find it and carry my pages with me as I go. I will try to find the Queen and stop this hive before it destroys the journal- and everything else in its path."

The writing didn't stop there, however; at the end of the page there was a scribbled end note.

"Found the Queen," Dipper read. "Managed to destroy her. I still have no knowledge of the motives or reasons behind these creatures' existence, if they were merely brought into being by themselves or if they were created by another for a certain purpose. But for now, both the journal and I will remain safe."

Well, that didn't make any sense. If the author had destroyed the Queen, then why were these creatures still here? If the Queen was killed, then shouldn't they all have died as well?

"The colony was not numerous. At most, it contained perhaps two hundred insects. Their abilities made them difficult to combat but not impossible. The Queen measures roughly three times the height and width of the workers, which I have attempted to illustrate on the following page. As I could not acquire a specimen, my illustration will not be entirely accurate."

The next page was a rough sketch of what looked more like a spider. It had six legs, however, just like the rest of the Dynocians. The head was small, in contrast to the nearly spherical body, and the whole thing looked to be covered in hairs. Dipper wrinkled his nose just looking at it. He hoped they wouldn't have to fight that thing.

The book didn't have anything to say on how to kill these creatures- or incapacitate them, even. Sure, the author had destroyed the Queen, but how? What had happened? What weapons had he or she used? Not for the first time, Dipper felt a twinge of contempt for the author. It was, of course, short lived and quickly pushed aside. After all, the author had done the favor of writing the journals in the first place, so there really wasn't anything Dipper could say against him or her.

But the problem still remained- what were they going to do about the Dynocians?

Dipper closed the journal and slid it under the television once more.

o0O0o

The nights never passed easily, as Dipper was quick to learn. He'd stayed up all night a few times before, whether it was in order to finish a book or… well, no, that was really the only reason he'd ever stayed up all night before.

But now, with no way to pass through the night unconscious, Dipper had to sit through the whole damn thing.

And as he was brimming with nervous energy because he _knew _what was wrong but he couldn't tell a single person, Dipper flew in tight circles downstairs, waiting for the sun to rise. He couldn't just wake them up, obviously. What could they even do right now? They didn't know where these creatures were supposed to live- in the forest, obviously, but where in the forest? The middle? The edge? More likely than not, Mabel would be angry at him for waking her up in the middle of the night and Bill would probably just ignore him. Or accuse him of trying to wear his own body down.

Dipper was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn't notice the steady footsteps descending the stairs until he nearly ran straight through-

Grunkle Stan?

Stan padded down the stairs, crossing the room and heading through the gift shop, not bothering to stop by the desk or turn into the side room that led to the television. Dipper hovered closer, curious. It looked like Stan was heading for… the vending machine? Why? Was Stan hungry? Why didn't he just pick a snack out of the fridge?

He swerved over to get a better view of Stan-and his great uncle stopped short, staring directly at Dipper.

Dipper panicked. Could Stan see him? How was that possible? Did that mean Stan could hear him as well?

It was then he remembered the sock puppet he'd been using to turn the pages of the journal. Thankfully, he'd hidden the journal under the television again, but- of course- the sock puppet would appear to be hovering in mid-air to any onlooker. And in this case, Stan certainly qualified as "any onlooker".

Stupid, _stupid!_

Dipper, completely out of ideas, did nothing. He tried to make the puppet as still as possible. Maybe if he didn't let it move, Stan would assume he was hallucinating? Yeah, that could work. Then he'd just leave Dipper alone, and get back to whatever it was he was doing.

Stan took off his glasses and rubbed them on his shirt, but by the time Dipper thought to move the puppet out of the way while he had the chance, Stan had finished.

Stan, glasses now perched on his potato of a nose, squinted his eyes and walked up towards the puppet. He cautiously raised his hand, inching it forward as if to touch it. What would happen? Would he be able to feel Dipper's hand inside the puppet?

Stan's fingers brushed the front of the puppet.

Dipper wrenched his hand out instinctively, shrinking back and away from Stan. The puppet fell to the ground with a soft _thump, _right at Stan's feet.

Stan bent over and picked up the puppet. He turned it over, but there were no markings to be found, apart from the two googly eyes and the yarn-and-wire arms that were glued to the beige fabric. Squinting harder, he brought it closer to his face.

Dipper waited with baited breath, hoping against hope that Stan wouldn't somehow figure out that it was him controlling the puppet and that Bill was actually in his body and what if he found out and what would he do what would happen this wasn't part of the deal what would Bill do would he hurt Grunkle Stan-

Stan dropped the puppet onto the ground. He turned, scanning the Shack for anyone who might be lurking there. Dipper froze as Stan's gaze passed over him, but nothing happened. Stan gave the room one last look before returning up the stairs.

Dipper let out a relieved sigh- though it wasn't really a sigh, because he technically couldn't inhale air, and did that mean he didn't have to breathe? Could he hold his breath indefinitely?- and picked the puppet back up.

Whatever Stan had been doing, he'd been cautious enough not to do it when he thought someone- or something- was watching him.

Huh.

o0O0o

"You remembered the books, right?" Dipper reminded them, as they made their way into the forest.

"For the millionth time, Dipper, _yes._" Mabel pulled the romance novel that Grenda had left behind a few days ago. The cover bore a girl swooning into a muscled man's arms- well, sort of arms. They were tentacles, technically. The title read "_Under the Sea_".

"Right, sorry, just checking." Dipper peered through the trees, curiously. "So they should be pretty close. Uh, not near the edge, but not too deep. They live close enough that they can still get to the town to eat whenever they want, but far away enough that it's hard to find them."

"So what are we looking for?" Mabel asked. "I mean, how do we know where they are?"

"We wait until they attack."

"Oh, _fantastic _plan." Bill pulled out the book he'd taken off the shelf at random. Dipper's vest was pretty heavy-duty; he could hold quite a few things on the inside pockets. "Just wait and get attacked. Perfect."

"Oh, shut up." Dipper, who was drifting in and out through the trees to see if there was any trace of a creature that had passed through, looked over his shoulder. "It's not like you have a better plan."

Mabel giggled.

They walked for a while in silence, apart from Mabel's occasional commentary and humming. Dipper felt frustration rising every time he scanned a tree, only to find it unscathed. The sun swept up above the tops of the trees, until it was directly above them, and then began, slowly, to sink back down again.

"Your meat-sack hurts," Bill complained. "I think it wants food."

"We packed a lunch," Dipper reminded him. "Eat that."

"Shooting Star ate mine when she thought I couldn't see her." Bill shrugged. Beside him, Mabel choked.

"Mabel." Dipper frowned at his sister.

"I was _hungry._"

"And now _I'm _hungry."

"Well, it won't do either of you any good if you keep arguing like that-"

"Oh, says you. Like you never argue ever-"

"Your meatsack is still grumbling-"

"Shhhh!"

Dipper slapped the puppet over Mabel's mouth, freezing in midair.

"What-"

"_Shhhh!_" Bill reluctantly fell silent, crossing Dipper's arms and frowning. Dipper listened intently, eyes fixated on a cloud so as not to let his sight distract his scent. A moment passed in which none of them moved or spoke, and then Mabel sneezed.

"Sorry," she whispered, wiping her nose.

Bill snorted. "Relax, Pine Tree. We haven't seen anything out here for the last three hours; we're not going to-" Bill broke off very suddenly, looking at Mabel. "Shooting Star," he said, raising an eyebrow. "Weren't the instructions to have clothing _without _words written on them?"

Mabel looked down at the front of her pink sweater, where the colored shooting star was stitched. "Yes?" she asked, confused.

"Then why," Bill asked, stepping back a little, "is there a creature on your back?"

Slowly, Dipper's eyes slid to Mabel's back. Sure enough, an insect about the size of Dipper's hand was resting, wings open but not moving. It twitched, and then scurried up to her neck.

Mabel shrieked, spinning around in circles and grabbing at her neck. Her fist clenched around the insect and she pried it off of her sweater, horrified. "Ew! Ew, Dipper, it's all slimey, ew, ew, _ew- _what do I do with it?"

"Um," said Dipper. "Uh, keep holding it; we don't want it to get away. Bill, get a page out."

Bill pulled out his book, ripped out the last page, and dropped it to the ground. The insect in Mabel's hand squirmed and writhed beneath her fingers.

"Mabel, let it go."

The insect dropped to the ground, making a beeline for the page. It began chewing mechanically at the page, pincers cutting the paper neatly into strips as it consumed the words.

"There's only one?" Dipper looked at the Dynocian curiously. "That's weird. I thought there would be a swarm. Maybe it's a scout."

Something whacked the sock puppet and landed on the forest floor. Dipper blinked, and there were two Dynocians gnawing at the paper, now. He blinked again, and there were three. Four.

"Uh, Dipper…" Mabel stepped away from the paper, looking around the forest.

"I think you were right about the swarm thing," Bill commented, sounding rather amused. "Look, there's almost twenty, now."

"Uh-" Mabel hopped up and down as two-three-four of the Dynocians scrambled up her sweater and to her neck. "Dipper, why are they- _ow!-_ why are they doing that- I'm not wearing words, I promise!"

"Wait a minute, does your sweater have a tag?" Dipper whacked the sock puppet at the Dynocians." Don't just stand there, Bill, help get these things off!" More Dynocians swarmed in, their wings buzzing. Two landed in Mabel's hair and she yelped, trying to bat them away.

The Dynocians were indeed nearly done with the paper now, numbers reaching the hundreds, and began to swarm around Mabel after the words had been devoured off the page. Bill merely ripped out another page of the book and tossed it on the ground. A few of the Dynocians leapt from Mabel's neck and joined the others on the forest floor.

"Come on, come on, let's get out of here," Mabel said, scratching at her neck where the insects had been crawling. "Let's _go._" She pulled out her own book, opened it, and dropped it to the ground at her feet. The insects crawling over her leapt off instantly, instead investing themselves in the book. Mabel breathed a sigh of relief, watching them.

Bill tore out another page and tossed it at the insects as Mabel turned and ran in the direction of the Shack.

"Leave the book, let's go!" Dipper shouted as the insects clicked and buzzed, wings fluttering and pincers snapping. "Come _on!_"

Bill threw the book at the pile of insects, which collectively swarmed around it and began ripping it apart. The buzzing noise was nearly deafening, now.

"If we get far enough away before they finish the books, then I think they won't come after us," Dipper said, as the three of them ran back to the Shack. "I don't think we could fight all of those off; that was more than I thought there would be."

"Do you think there's a queen?" Mabel asked, huffing as she ran.

"I don't know. If there is, she wasn't there."

"Oh, really? Hadn't noticed." Bill panted as he forced Dipper's legs to run. "Pine Tree, your fleshsticks are _awful. _How do you stand these things?"

"If you don't like it, you can always leave," Dipper pointed out.

"Give it another week."

o0O0o

"The book said their colonies weren't very big," Dipper reported, as Bill and Mabel sat in their respective beds in the attic. "Either they rebuilt their colony after the author went after the first queen, or there were other colonies, or they fused colonies, or something." He shrugged. "I don't know what's up with them. But a few books won't be enough to stop them or distract them, not if we want to get rid of them."

"We could make a bunch of copies," Mabel began, but Dipper was one step ahead of her.

"This is the page with the most words," Dipper said, forcing the puppet to open the dictionary on Mabel's bed to a page somewhere around the beginning. "Mabel, you can go and make copies. Make as many as you can; we'll need them."

"Wait a minute." Mabel took the dictionary, marked the page by folding the corner over, and closed it. "Wait a minute, Dipper, the _copier!_"

Bill looked between the twins, curious. "The copier?" he repeated.

Dipper beamed.


	7. Chapter 7

Insects skittered down onto the floor. The copier was just as he remembered: out of date and full of dust. Mabel pushed the lid up, peering in. A group of spiders crawled out from their nest, and Dipper could have sworn they looked ashamed.

"This is your plan?" Bill made a face; he stared at the machine as if it were beneath him.

"Almost," Mabel said, taking her hand off the lid. It slammed back down, clouds of dust exploding around them. Dipper was thankful he had neither the lungs nor the throat to breathe it in as he watched Mabel cough. "Bill, you need to be out of Dipper's body for this to work," she added, waving the dust and grime away.

Bill smiled. "Oh, Shooting Star, you really thought it'd be that easy?"

Dipper sighed. "We're not trying to trick you. Look, I'll be right over here the whole time." He retreated to the furthest corner of the room, giving Bill a pointed look.

"Forget it, Pine Tree." Bill shook his head, smiling ever so slightly.

"Bill, seriously. We don't have time for this." Dipper clenched his ghostly fists again.

"Nope." Bill gave a smile and casually walked away, not bothering to glance behind to see what Mabel had to say.

"But- Dipper, do something!" she pleaded, looking hopelessly at the sock hovering in midair.

"How can I do anything? I'm a _sock!_"

Bill descended the stairs, leaving the twins bickering behind him.

o0O0o

Breakfast was a terse affair. Mabel sat opposite her brother's puppetmaster, chewing cereal that may have once been delicious, but had long since lost its taste. Mabel had decided to remedy this problem by dousing the clusters of wheat with as many sprinkles as she could. Grunkle Stan watched from the end of the table, a look of muted worry over Mabel's likely impending stomachache. Bill ate only what he knew would be required to keep his body from collapsing, not sharing a word across the table.

"You two have a fight, or something?" Stan asked, when the silence proved itself to be nearly tangible. "Yeesh, this is like Baby Fights, but boring."

"I'm going upstairs," Bill announced, leaving his bowl of wheat mush to soak up as much milk as it could before dissolving entirely. Mabel stood as well.

"Me too."

Bill gave a mild glare but no further comment as Mabel tucked her chair away and stood. But then- her sweater caught the edge of the table and she stumbled, catching the chair to right herself. The puppet, which had taken to resting in her sweater pocket since they'd confronted Bill, had caught itself on the table as well, and as Mabel stood up, it tumbled out and onto the floor.

Oh no. Dipper looked to Stan, who was staring at the spot on the ground where the puppet had fallen. Of course he'd recognize it as the floating sock from that night, of _course_ he would. Dipper hadn't told Mabel about literally almost running into Grunkle Stan that night; he hadn't thought it was important.

Trying very hard to seem as though it was no more than a puppet, Mabel bent down and picked the sock up, stuffing it back into her sweater pocket.

"Wait." But Stan had evidently recognized the puppet after all. "Let me see that." From the end of the table, Stan extended a hand, looking expectantly at Mabel.

"This?" Mabel giggled, shrugging and looking anywhere but into Grunkle Stan's eyes. "Just a puppet, nothing interesting."

"I said let me see that," Stan repeated, not taking no for an answer.

Reluctantly, and as slowly as possible, Mabel pulled the puppet out from her pocket and handed it over.

Bill turned the puppet over in his hand, squinting through his glasses. Bill gave Dipper a questioning look.

"He saw the puppet- I- he knows there's something weird about it," he blurted, remembering then that no one but Bill could hear or see him without the puppet. "He might figure out- I don't know how much he might figure out," Dipper stammered. Bill's eyes flickered from Dipper to Stan to Mabel, back to Stan, back to Dipper. "Don't just stand there," Dipper pleaded, "_do something!_"

"Where did you get this?" Stan asked Mabel, holding the puppet up a little. Mabel opened her mouth, and Dipper knew what was going to happen, now. Mabel would say proudly that she'd made the puppet, and then Stan would really know that something wasn't right, and then he'd keep a closer eye on them and then he might find out that Bill was in Dipper's body and then what? Would he figure out that it was Bill? Would Bill be banished? That would mean…

Would he ever see Bill again?

"We found it," Bill cut in, before Mabel had the chance to speak- and Dipper might have been imagining it, but Bill's voice seemed almost as if it were trembling.

"Found it?"

"In the woods," Bill continued. "We were looking for-"

But whatever it was they had apparently been looking for, Dipper never found out, because before Bill could finish his sentence, Grunkle Stan slammed the puppet down on the table, looking nearly murderous. The only time Dipper had ever seen his uncle like this was when they'd had to fight back against a horde of zombies. And even then, he'd looked more panicked than angry. This… this was something Dipper hoped he'd never have to see again.

"I _told _you," Stan thundered, looking more at Bill now than he was at Mabel. After all, Dipper had been the one to make the promise, hadn't he? "I told you not to go looking for trouble. This place- you don't know what you're dealing with, here. I don't want either of you to get hurt." He unclenched his fist, the puppet falling limply onto the table. "That puppet- something's wrong with it. I don't know what, and I don't _want_ to know what. Just put it back where it came from. And if I see you two getting into any more trouble, I'm taking that book of yours away for the rest of the summer," he threatened. Leaving his plate, Stan stood and left the kitchen, leaving the three of them alone.

Dipper sank a few feet in relief.

"What was that all about?" Mabel demanded, folding her arms and looking accusingly at Bill. "Why'd you say we found it in the woods? Now he's all mad."

Dipper, after hurriedly checking to make sure that Stan wasn't listening by the stairs, stuck his hand back in the puppet.

"It's my fault- Bill saved our butts back there," he explained, nodding to Bill. "I… Stan saw the puppet one night. He didn't see me, obviously, but he… He didn't do anything. He just saw it floating. But he recognized it, now. If he'd known we'd made it, I think he might have found out about Bill. And _then… _I don't know what would happen, then. He might get rid of him, or something."

"Oh." Mabel looked at the puppet worriedly. "Now what are we going to do?"

"We can't use the puppet anymore," Dipper agreed, looking up in thought. "We could make another one, but then we'd be running the risk of him seeing that one, too, and then he'd get suspicious of us finding, I dunno, another puppet in the woods."

"I could make it all bedazzled- that way he'd _know _we made it. I made it."

"Still. Now he thinks it's just some weird creepy floating Gravity Falls artifact. If he had any idea that Bill was-"

"We'll use the copier."

Mabel and Dipper turned. Bill was holding the puppet thoughtfully.

"What?" he asked, as both of them stared. "It's the only way we'll be able to talk to you. And after all, it's less fun being human without getting to listen to you two bicker."

o0O0o

They stood around the copier, watching as its gears ground into life. With a final hum, the machine seemed to glow, ready for its next task.

"You get out of Dipper's body," Mabel ordered, pointing at Bill. "I'll put it up on the copier. After the copy comes out here," she pointed to the end of the copier, where the tray table was set up, "I'll get his body off the copier and then you can get back in."

Bill nodded in agreement.

"Dipper," Mabel said then, looking at the sock hovering at her eye level. "Once the copy comes out of the page, you have to possess it. But until it comes out of there, you stand by the corner."

"Got it."

"Everyone ready?"

They both nodded, and Mabel opened up the lid of the copier. Bill obediently slipped out of Dipper's body. The body fell into Mabel's arms, and she hoisted him up onto the copier with a degree of difficulty.

Dipper couldn't help but stare at Bill's true form. It seemed so unnatural, now, after seeing Bill in his body for so long. The triangle snapped himself a cane, twirling it to pass the time.

As she pressed the copier button, the machine sprang into action, scanning Dipper's body with the green ray. Mabel tugged Dipper's body off the copier the moment the scan ended, and before she'd lowered it halfway to the floor, Bill had already possessed it again.

"Dipper, now!"

The copy slid out of the end of the machine, fluttering to the floor. It trembled for a moment before the picture of Dipper's body gained form and tumbled out of the page and onto the floor. Dropping the puppet, Dipper soared into the copy of his own body.

Cautiously, he stood. The body stood with him. Grinning widely, he pumped a fist into the air.

"It worked!"

Mabel jumped a little and ran over to hug her brother. "Missed seeing you, bro-bro. Well, seeing the real you." She pulled away and shoved his arm. Dipper stumbled sideways.

"Oh, man," Dipper muttered, once he'd gotten his balance back. "Gravity. That's. Yeah, that's a thing."

"Takes a while to get used to, eh, Pine Tree?" Bill was watching him with vague interest. "Or not Pine Tree? Your hat's the only thing that didn't copy over with you."

"What? Oh, yeah." Dipper pulled off the copied hat. As Tyrone's and the rest of his clones' hats had been, his hat was now blank on the front.

"We can't make them the same," Mabel said, as if were obvious. "Then I wouldn't be able to tell you apart."

"We have to, or Stan will notice that my hat's changed," Dipper pointed out.

"Why would he care? He changed his hat, didn't he?"

"Oh. Yeah, true." Dipper shrugged. "But if he sees Bill and I separately, then won't he notice that my hat keeps switching back and forth?"

"You're worrying too much." Mabel shook her head. "It won't matter."

Dipper sighed. "All… all right. We'll just draw something else on this one."

"Like what?"

Dipper took off the hat and stared at the blank design, considering. "I could draw the Big Dipper," he said, shrugging. "Or I could just leave it blank."

"Blank would probably be better," Bill mused. "After all, you got your hat from the store here, didn't you?"

"Yeah," Dipper said, nodding. "How did you-"

"Please. You think I never happened to see the stack of identical hats by the door?" Bill snickered. "Just because I'm the Master of the Mind doesn't mean I don't take the time for simple observation."

"Fair enough." Dipper fit the hat back onto his head, brushing his hands through his hair as he did so. "So now all we have to worry about is Stan seeing more than one of me at a time."

"And how do we do that?"

"Very carefully."

o0O0o

"Sleep well, kid? You look… weird."

"Oh, better than ever."

"Dipper was up a little late reading," Mabel supplied easily. She'd gotten the hang of lying a little more, at least to Stan. Dipper suspected she was a little lax about lying to Stan, if only because he lied so much himself.

"Pah! Reading. What's in your books that's so interesting, anyway? Heck, didn't you say that was a summer reading list? You know, for school?" Stan crossed his arms, leaning forward against the counter. Mabel took the opportunity to knock his hat off with a flick of her fingers. He caught it before it could land on the counter and popped it back on his head, giving Mabel a look.

"Hey, some of them are interesting," Bill defended, in the most Dipper-like offended tone of voice he could make.

"Whatever you say, kid." Stan shrugged, standing from the counter again. "I need you two to go out and see if the signs are still there. I found some of the old ones wrecked a few days ago."

"Wrecked?" Mabel, who had been reorganizing the counter again in an attempt to use the knickknacks to draw a smiley face, paused in her work. "What do you mean, wrecked?"

"Oh, you know, the usual. Torn down and all the words cut out. Usually they write their own slogans.  
>Or they cut off the 'S' in 'shack'." Stan scowled. "Diabolical."<p>

"Yeah, sure, we'll go out," Mabel chirped, abandoning the counter and running to the door.

"I'll come with you," Bill offered.

"What's with you two? Aren't you supposed to, I don't know, complain about wanting to stay inside?" Stan eyed the two of them shrewdly.

"We've been inside all day," Bill tried.

"You got out of bed an hour ago."

"Well, there you have it." Bill crossed his arms, as if this explanation were perfectly valid.

"You know what? I just remembered something." Stan snapped his fingers, looking between the two of them. "I don't care!" He laughed as if it were the funniest joke he'd ever told. Though, granted, that was generally his response to the jokes he told normally.

Mabel and Bill hurried out of the room. Stan turned back to the counter and began putting it back in order again.

Dipper hurried down the stairs.

"Hey- didn't you just leave?"

"I- uh- I had to go back for something," Dipper lied, running past Stan before his uncle could notice the different pattern on his hat. "Sorry-Mabel's-waiting-outside-I-gotta-go-_bye!_"

He slammed the door behind him before Stan could get a word in edgewise, jogging towards the woods where Bill and Mabel were waiting.

"Hey," he panted, as he caught up to them. "Nice job back there, actually. You… really sounded like me."

"It wasn't that hard," Bill said, grinning brightly as he led Dipper's body into the forest, Mabel trailing behind. "You're pretty simple, Pine Tree." Dipper began to scowl, but eased into a smile as he realized Bill was merely teasing.

"Jerk."

"Okay, okay, you two, quit it." Mabel punched Dipper's arm. "Just because he makes a better you than _you_ do-"

"Oh, shut up." Dipper pushed his sister away, ignoring Bill's laughter. He pulled out the books he'd been carrying and handed two each to Bill and Mabel. "I brought more books this time because I want to find the queen," he said, getting down to business. "I left the journal back at the Shack, so I think it should be safe. But these things are getting close enough to eat up the signs pointing there; we need to stop them before it's too late."

"That journal of yours is handwritten," Bill pointed out, taking the books and stuffing them under Dipper's surprisingly roomy vest. "And as far as we've seen so far, those bugs only eat the printed word, right?"

"Sure, okay," Dipper admitted. "But still, we don't want to take that chance."

"True." Bill glanced back at the Shack, still visible through the few layers of trees they were hidden behind. "Let's go."

They had made it past the knotted stump that Dipper had hidden the original sock puppet behind when Mabel fell.

Bored with the surrounding nature, Mabel was taking to stepping in a pattern only she could decipher, trying to balance the books on her head as she did so. And as the top book slipped, her foot caught underneath a root.

With a yell, Mabel catapulted forward and crashed to the ground, hair tossing itself over her face, kicking up dirt.

"Mabel!" Dipper knelt beside her, brushing the hair from her eyes and helping her stand again. Mabel took a step forward and hissed, crouching again.

"My ankle," she whimpered. "I think- I twisted it, or something."

"You should get back to the shack," Bill advised, looking down at her now swelling ankle with interest. "Ha, I wonder how long _that's _gonna take to heal."

"Shut up, Bill," Dipper grumbled. He sighed. "He's right, though. You should get back to the shack." He looked up at the sky. "By the time we take you back, we'll have lost too much daylight. We'll just go tomorrow," he decided.

"No, I can walk fine," Mabel said, grabbing a nearby stick and leaning on it as she stood up. "You two go ahead."

"Mabel, it's not-"

"_Go. _You said it yourself; those bugs are getting closer every day. If you don't find the Queen now, then they could destroy the Shack- the journal!"

"We still don't know if they'll eat the-"

"_Dipper!"_

Mabel snapped off a side branch of the stick she was leaning against and whacked it on Dipper's arm. "Just go, okay? I'll go back to the shack myself. You two go find the Queen."

Dipper sighed. "All right. I… I don't like it, but all right."

He took Mabel's books back and passed one to Bill and one to himself. Nodding at Mabel as she walked away, he and Bill set off deeper into the forest.

They walked together in silence, occasionally glancing over their shoulders or into the woods. Having two books on one side and one book on another was more than a little uncomfortable, and Dipper stopped a few times to rearrange them again. Eventually he gave up and, keeping one book on each side of his vest, carried the third in his hands. Bill didn't seem to have any sort of problem with an unbalanced vest, and walked in silence, stopping whenever Dipper did and waiting.

It wasn't until they couldn't hear Mabel's footsteps anymore that either of them spoke.

"So," Dipper prompted, starting the conversation in the awkward way that all forced together people are wont to do. "You, uh. Like it here? I mean. Uh, not Gravity Falls, I mean- you like being in a body?"

"If I didn't, I wouldn't be here," Bill said, and that was that. There wasn't any extra explanation. There wasn't much emotion to his tone. Dipper sighed, frustrated.

"Yeah, yeah. Whatever." He flipped through the book as they walked, trying to find which page would have the most words in it. "I just mean. I didn't really believe you, back there. When you said you were lonely, and stuff."

"Eh, I didn't really expect you to." Dipper looked up from his book, focusing his attention instead of the identical replica of himself. Well. Technically _he _was the identical replica. Of himself.

"But now I think I'm starting to," Dipper added, just to make it clear.

Now it was Bill's turn to look at Dipper. It was almost as if he was calculating Dipper, trying to see if everything added up. Bill's eyes flickered between both of Dipper's, searching, honing in. Then they snapped back to the woods in front of him.

After a pause that was perhaps a bit too long, he spoke again.

"You don't."

"I _do._"

"Why would you?"

"Because I can see it," Dipper pressed. "I can see that you like being with us. Being in a body like this. You like talking to us, you like hanging out with us. You like eating and drinking and sleeping and everything that comes along with being human." When Bill still didn't look convinced, he sifted through his memories of their time together, searching for something that would perhaps make Bill understand. "You like it here, I can tell. Even if you won't admit it to me. Or to yourself. And we like having you here. _I _like having you here."

The silence following this was unlike anything Dipper had ever felt. The atmosphere was muffling, and each step they took- each crunch of leaves- echoed not through the air but through his own mind, as if they were the only two in the world to have ever walked here, as if this space, this moment- as if it all belonged to them.

"Thank you."

Dipper turned in surprise, stopping short. The lack of footsteps pounded in his skull. Bill looked at him, smiled ever so slightly, and turned back to the path.

Dipper followed beside him.


	8. Chapter 8

So far, things weren't looking too promising. They'd wandered around through the woods for the better part of an hour, and there was still no sign of the stupid creatures. Dipper's feet were beginning to hurt from walking this much, and Bill hadn't glanced at him once since their last conversation. The sun wasn't falling quite yet, but it felt as if they'd been walking for a day and a half.

"So," Dipper said, after the silence had surpassed 'awkward' and moved on to 'unbearable'. "Uh."

"What, you're trying to make small talk?" Bill guessed, taking a book out from under his vest and tossing it up and down in the air.

"Well, _I _dunno. We've been walking for an hour and we haven't seen anything- the most interesting thing that's happened so far was Mabel hurting her leg. What do you want to do, just- ignore each other?"

"It was working pretty well until you ruined it."

Dipper sighed. He supposed he probably shouldn't have expected anything else. "Fine. But let's just get-"

_CLANG._

"_AUGH!_"

Dipper tripped over his own foot, which was suddenly unable to move itself. Pain seared from his ankle, he could barely feel his toes- "Oh my god, oh my god, help," he babbled, looking down at the bear trap that had caught his foot. "Oh my god, is it bleeding? I think it's bleeding, oh my _god._"

"Relax, kid, you'll be fine." Bill kept walking, not even bothering to look back at Dipper, who was slowly growing nauseous at the sight of the blood slicked bear trap.

"I will _not _be fine," Dipper snapped, looking up at Bill before looking back down at his leg again. "Hey, come back here! _Look_ at this thing! How are we even going to get back? Oh my god, I'm going to have to chew my own leg off."

"Sheesh, kid, I mean it. Relax." Bill shrugged, turning back and folding his arms. "You're in a copied body, right? All we have to do is go make another one."

"Oh." Dipper blinked. "Right." Giving the body he'd had so little time to enjoy a final look, he concentrated his energy on slipping out of the thing, leaving it unconscious and still caught by the foot. The pain instantly vanished, and he let out a breath of relief.

"There you go." Bill smiled brightly. "Now, let's go find those… whatever you called them."

"Dynocians," Dipper muttered, crossing his arms as he floated after Bill. "And _I _didn't call them that, the _journal _did." He followed sulkily after Bill. Really, he had missed being in his body. It didn't seem fair that he had to give it up so soon, just because he'd happened to step on a bear trap. "They _should _be near the center of the woods," he muttered, as they made their way deeper into the trees. He turned around once more, looking back at his old body. It was weird to see his own body walking and talking for itself, but it was much, much weirder to see his own body lying bloody and unconscious.

They walked until his body was just out of sight, stopping in front of an enormous tree. The leaves were so many that they entirely blocked out the sun. Dipper didn't want to guess how high it was- taller than three or four Mystery Shacks built on top of one another.

"Stop," Bill said, then, holding out a hand. As Dipper was completely intangible, he passed right through it before registering exactly what Bill had said. Bill looked up at the tree, eyes narrowing. "There's something here."

"I can't hear anything."

"Shh!"

"And you're the only one who can hear me, so why should _I _be quiet?"

"Because I can't hear myself think," Bill snapped. "Hush up, kid."

"Ugh, fine." Dipper crossed his arms, looking around the forest for whatever it was Bill had apparently heard.

The tree in front of them wobbled. Dipper frowned at it. The branches and leaves appeared to rustle, which was odd, seeing as there was no wind-

It wasn't a tree at all.

"Pull out the books, _pull out the books!_" Dipper yelled, hovering over Bill, gesticulating wildly. The books- even though Bill had three of them- would not be nearly enough to hold back the multitude of creatures that were undoubtedly ready to strike. Nevertheless, Bill did as he was told and clumsily tugged out the three books from behind his vest. He tossed them forward onto the forest floor.

The tree shattered instantly, dissolving into a mass of insects, all clamoring for the books.

"Go, go, _GO!_"

Bill turned to leave, but something grabbed at his ankle- it was the Dynocians, they were pulling him back, back into the wave of black insects, clattering their pincers, sounding a cantankerous roar up through the trees. Above the forest, flocks of birds took flight, scared off by the mere sound of he swarm.

"What-" Dipper could only watch as Bill- who was yelling that same horrified yell as he had when they'd tickled him- was pulled into the swarm and out of sight. "_NO!" _He tried helplessly to pry some of the insects off of Bill, but couldn't do a thing.

There was only one way to get Bill out.

o0O0o

The pain was exquisite. Each step Dipper took sent his foot further and further past the teeth of the trap, tugging and ripping at his skin. A trail of blood followed him, zigzagging from tree to tree as he leaned on them for support.

Just past a small clearing, he could hear Bill screaming- at least, he was pretty sure that was what Bill sounded like, when he was screaming.

"Hold on, Bill, I'm coming!" he yelled, hobbling faster out of the small oddly clear patch of grass. It was then that he realized that it wasn't just a clearing- this was where the swarm of Dynocians had been. If they were taking Bill somewhere, would that be their nest? Were they bringing Bill to their Queen?

Why had they even taken Bill in the first place? He'd thrown the books, hadn't he? What did they want?

The bear trap caught on a root and he fell forward onto his stomach, all the air coming out of him at once. He got to his knees, shakily, arms trembling. Ugh, fantastic. The only thing that could possibly have made this worse was-

He heard it before he saw it. The leaves above him began to rustle, dapple. The ground became suddenly speckled, thick raindrops falling at random from the trees.

What would happen when this body disintegrated? Would his consciousness die as well?

Dipper didn't want to find out.

With a heavy sigh, he forced himself out of the copied body. Along with the relief of his foot came the crushing guilt that now he had no way to help his-

His what?

Friend?

Bill wasn't a friend. He knew that for sure.

He shook the thought from his head. There was no way he could help Bill now, and no way he could save his own body- if he couldn't save his body, he'd be stuck as a ghost _forever. _And if his original body was destroyed, would that also get rid of him?

The screams abruptly stopped. Dipper's heart skipped a beat. What did that mean? What had happened? Was Bill dead? No, of course Bill wasn't dead- was Dipper's real body dead? And if it was, then why was he still here? Was he just going to have to be a ghost for the rest of his life? Would he even _age? _What would Grunkle Stan think? What would Mabel think? No, she'd know he was a ghost, that'd be okay. But-

The presence of something very bright, yellow, and triangular interrupted his mental babbling.

Bill had emerged from the trees, carrying Dipper's unconscious body.

"Ugh, hive minds are the _worst._" Bill let the body drop onto the forest floor. There were scratch marks all over his face, his arms. His clothes were torn beyond repair. The hat had a chunk missing from it at the back, and one of his eyes was bruised and swollen.

"Are you okay?" Dipper asked, immediately.

"Me? Fine and dandy," Bill said, shrugging. He looked down at Dipper's body, and then- his eyes caught the bloody trail leading to the bear trap. "Wait a minute, kid. Where'd that copy go?"

In response, Dipper looked up at the rain. It was odd, knowing it was raining but not being able to feel it. Bill looked back at the bloodied bear trap, seeming to piece together why it had miraculously moved from one spot in the forest to another.

"You tried to come back?" Bill asked, looking still down at the trail of blood. The demon had probably seen much worse; Dipper didn't know why he was making such a big fuss out of it.

"Well, yeah." Dipper shrugged. "I mean," he added, hurriedly, "if my body had been totally destroyed, then we wouldn't have been able to make any more copies, right?" He shrugged, giving a shaky laugh.

"Oh." Bill's eye swiveled back to Dipper's real, unconscious, body.

"Your noodle arms weren't enough to get 'em off, so I had to freeze the whole pack. But since I can't do anything in your body, I had to leave it." He shrugged. "Plus, the thing was just uncomfortable."

"My body was uncomfortable?" Dipper repeated, crossing his arms.

"Look at it!" Bill retorted. Dipper looked.

"Oh. Well. Yeah, okay, I get how _that's_ uncomfortable. Now that you got it all beat up." He frowned. "Is it just gonna stay like that?" he asked, trying to sound disappointed.

"Pfft. Of course not, kid." Bill snapped his fingers and Dipper watched once more as every visible injury oh his body healed itself instantaneously. "Come on," Bill snapped, then slipped back into Dipper's body. He gave the fingers an experimental wiggle, and then the feet. "Let's get out of here."

"But I thought you said you froze all of those things."

"Only temporary, it won't last."

"Then won't they come back to the Shack? What about the journal?"

"Probably not?" Bill jogged past the clearing and towards the edge of the forest. "It'll take a little while for 'em to thaw out- you know, metaphorically speaking."

"How long do we have?"

"Probably overnight."

"_Probably?" _

o0O0o

"Look, kid, I wouldn't worry too much about it."

"Of course _you _wouldn't, they can't hurt you!"

"If they can't hurt me, then they can't hurt you, either!"

"But they could still get the journal."

"Kid, relax. They're not going to."

"You don't know that."

"Will you two quit squabbling for three seconds so we can get this done?" Mabel, whose leg had been miraculously healed before Grunkle Stan had even seen it injured in the first place, scowled at the demon in her brother's body. "Dipper, I know you can hear me- just stop being a butt for like ten seconds."

"Okay, this is gonna work just like it did last time," Mabel commanded, seemingly glad for her temporary position of power. "Bill, you get out of his body. I get him on the copier. Then Bill goes back in and Dipper gets in the copy, and shazam, we're done!" Mabel emphasized the ending of her plan by throwing her hands up in the air, the sleeves of her sweater falling down to her elbows.

"Actually," Bill said, and Mabel dropped her hands.

"No, we're not changing the plan. It's perfect! Plus, it worked last time." She frowned at Bill, who stepped back.

"Yeesh, relax." Bill shifted his weight onto one leg, crossing his arms. "I just thought we could put Pine Tree back where he belongs for a change. Mix it up, make it interesting."

"Back where I belong?" Dipper repeated, floating over to the copier.

"What do you mean?" Mabel asked, instantly suspicious.

"Why not put me in the copy instead?" Bill offered.

Now that was something Dipper certainly hadn't expected.

"Wait, but- why would you-"

"Okay!" Mabel didn't appear to question Bill's sudden decision, though, and here was nothing Dipper could do or say to stop her. "New plan!"

"Wait, Mabel-" But his sister had already heaved his body up onto the copier and punched the button at the top. She neither heard nor followed his plea, and before Dipper could protest any longer the paper slid out of the end of the copier, rippled, and spat out a copy.

And before Dipper could register that the obvious solution would be to stand by the end of the copier and inhabit the copy before Bill could, Bill had already made himself comfortable with the disposable body, leaving Dipper no choice but to float sulkily back into his own body.

"Say something only Dipper would know," Mabel demanded, rounding on her brother.

"Uh." Dipper chewed his lip.

"_Who stole the capers?"_

"What?" Dipper rolled his eyes. "I can't just _tell _you that, that'd ruin the whole book! And plus, then you'd just skip over the side story with Josh, and that's the part where they-"

"Yep, you're Dipper." Mabel poked him in the stomach.

"Ow, quit it."

"We'll have to keep watch overnight," Bill cut in, taking off the copied hat and inspecting the blank front. After apparently deeming it good enough for him to wear on his head, he threw it back on. "In case those things come back."

Mabel nodded in agreement alongside Dipper, having had heard the story from Bill not five minutes ago.

"We can take turns," Dipper proposed. "Like, you know. Watches. We'll each sleep a few hours and then wake the next person. There are three of us, and we have about nine hours to sleep, so we'll each take a three hour watch."

"Can I go first?" Mabel asked. "I don't want to have to wake up and then go back to sleep again, that sucks."

"Sure," Dipper said, nodding. "I'll go second. Bill, you'll go last. Whoever's keeping watch has to hold the journal." He didn't exactly like the idea of Bill being alone with the journal, let alone Bill being awake while they were both asleep, but hey- if Bill had wanted to, he could have destroyed the thing ages ago.

So everything would be fine.

o0O0o

Yawning, Dipper tossed about under the covers. Mabel was right- having to wake up and then go back to sleep after three hours wasn't fun. He adjusted his pillow again, knowing that whatever noise he made wouldn't bother Mabel- she was the deepest sleeper he knew of. Sighing, Dipper flopped onto his back and stared at the ceiling. There was just nothing he could do. There was nothing that would make his brain be quit, nothing that could make him tired, nothing that could lure him into unconsciousness. He screwed up his face and let it fall lax again, trying his best to relax.

After perhaps twenty minutes, he realized he wasn't getting anywhere. No matter how hard he tried, there was no way he was going back to sleep.

Well, at least he could give Bill a little more time.

Taking care not to wake his sister- though he really needn't have bothered- Dipper crept out of his room and down the stairs. He snuck back to the back porch, where he'd told Bill to stay-

No one was there.

Dipper's stomach turned around. What had Bill done? Where had he gone? Where was the journal? Had he taken it with him? _God, _he never should have trusted that stupid demon!

Anger, ice cold, welled up inside of him. He clenched his fists, grit his teeth. All he could do now was go tell Mabel. They'd just have to go look for him. _That's _why he'd wanted the copy body, so he could dispose of it and take the journal for himself! Idiot, Dipper had been such an _idiot! _

He turned to go back inside the shack, but the door had locked behind him. He almost punched the stupid thing, but resisted the urge. Instead, he jogged back past through the front doors and was halfway through the gift shop when he noticed something odd.

The vending machine was just out of place.

Abandoning his previous task of running upstairs to wake Mabel, Dipper tiptoed to the machine. Sure enough, it had been moved. The corners didn't match up with the dust stains. Dipper looked at one side, and then the other-

One side wasn't attached to the wall. It was slim, but there was definitely a gap between the machine and the wall. And there was some sort of light coming from the crack.

Carefully, Dipper pulled the machine back. It swung forward soundlessly, revealing a descending staircase.

Had it always been there? Who had built it? What was down there? Did Grunkle Stan even know about it?  
>Dipper's memory flashed back to the moment when Grunkle Stan had seen the puppet- he'd been hiding something, hadn't he? And hadn't it been in the middle of the night? What was he hiding?<p>

He and Mabel could look for Bill later. Right now, Dipper was far more interested in what Grunkle Stan was up to. And besides, if he woke up Mabel, she'd probably make too much noise. Dipper crept down the stairs, pulling the vending machine back as he did so. He left it cracked open just as it had been before, just in case he needed to get out quickly. He doubted Grunkle Stan would hurt him, though.

The light, which had seemed bright in contrast to the pitch blackness of the store, was actually quite dim. Dipper stumbled over his feet a couple times as he followed the stairs down, but evidently he hadn't made enough noise to warn anyone that he was coming. With each step he could see a little more of the stairs, as the light became brighter and brighter.

He stumbled forward as his foot hit not another descending stair, but the floor itself. He caught himself before he fell, waving his arms to keep from toppling over.

It was some sort of secret room. There was a desk, it looked like, in front of a glass wall. And beyond the wall was something Dipper couldn't completely make out. There was a picture frame on the desk, but it had been tipped over, glass smashed. Dipper didn't want to touch it, as curious as he was.

There was a movement past the glass wall. Someone was here, someone obviously hadn't expected to have been followed. Dipper clambered underneath the desk, hoping he hadn't been seen.

Footsteps sounded, closer now. A door opened from somewhere he couldn't see-Dipper guessed it led from the room into the space behind the glass wall- and then there was silence. Whoever had opened the door was looking in the room, trying to see if anyone was there. Dipper breathed through his mouth, so as not to make a sound, and tried to keep his muscles as still as possible.

Another footstep.

Dipper felt his hands shaking, sweating. He barely resisted the urge to brush them on his shorts.

The door closed again, muffling the retreating footsteps.

Furiously wiping his hands on his vest, Dipper crawled out from underneath the desk and snuck to the door. Behind the glass panels, he could just make out another person. And beyond them was a gigantic glowing light of some kind- was it a sort of machine? And who was that person? Dipper could almost make them out-

Of course, it all made sense. Grunkle Stan must have been coming down to this place, past the vending machine. But why? What was he doing? And what did the machine do?

Pushing back his fear of what his great uncle would do, Dipper straightened his vest and pushed the door open.

The person standing in front of the machine turned as the door squawked, announcing Dipper's presence, and the light bathed his face, casting his features into sharp focus-

Dipper only had time to glimpse his own face looking back at him for perhaps a second before the glowing machine growled low and the ground began to tremble. Before he could even look up to see what the machine was doing, hands were shoving him backward, towards the glass wall.

"_Get out of here, Pine Tree!" _

He felt the wall erupt before he could smell the smoke creeping through the cracks of the machine. He felt the heat of the engines exploding behind the panels that distributed the light before he saw the glass crack and shatter onto the ground. And he felt the shock of his own body hitting the glass wall before he saw his own copied body propelled upwards by the sheer force of the towering machine exploding, the sound ripping through his ears- as if the skin stretched over his eardrums was pulled tighter and tighter, until finally bursting from the tension and slamming a wave of sound into the inner canal- it rattled his skull and slammed his brain from side to side.

As the last remains of consciousness left him, Dipper squinted through the rising smoke.

"_Pine Tree."_

He focused his attention on breathing, letting his chest just rise and fall, rise and fall.

"_Pine Tree."_

His hat must have been blown off- he could feel the air drifting through his hair, brushing past his scalp. His fingers began to tingle. He clenched his right fist, but the feeling didn't seem to subside.

Dipper let his eyelids sink.

"_Pine Tree."_


End file.
